


Fires Off The Shoulder of Orion

by droideka



Series: Semper Fidelis [1]
Category: Mass Effect Trilogy
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Big Buff Butch Shepard, F/F, Hard Science Fiction, Horror, Lesbian Character, Lesbian Character of Color, Renegade Shepard (Mass Effect), Slow Burn
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-06-08
Updated: 2019-07-28
Packaged: 2020-04-12 13:34:38
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 13
Words: 32,665
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19133071
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/droideka/pseuds/droideka
Summary: The Alliance resurrects Commander Shepard in secret, placing her at the center of the growing rift between humanity and the rest of the Council races. Under orders from the Alliance's enigmatic intelligence arm, Shepard must find a way to cross the Omega-4 relay and end the Collector threat. Loyalties are tested when a plot that threatens the tenuous galactic peace is revealed, and Shepard must unite a distrustful galaxy to face the coming Reapers.An AU where Cerberus exists as part of the Alliance, and Shepard is forced to reconcile her loyalty to her people and her duty to the galaxy.Set during the events of Mass Effect 2Rated for language, violence, and gore. Rating will be bumped in later chapters.*NOTE: this work was originally published in January of 2016. I’m republishing it after significant revisions of the plot, the pairings, and the grammar errors*





	1. the cosmic fugue

The FTL drive disengaged and the _Normandy_ slipped out of its mass effect envelope in a flare of blue shifted light. The ship gave a sickening lurch as the vessel and all aboard returned to a spacetime where physics still obeyed Einsteinian laws. But Shepard made so many jumps on so many ships that the rolling of the floor beneath her didn’t even break her stride. She made an impressive figure cutting across the crew deck, moving effortlessly in 30 kilograms of gear with her helmet tucked under her arm. Her dark hair was shaved close to her scalp on the sides, and worn short at her crown; it gleamed like polished armor in the harsh ship lights. Her mouth was quirked to the side, and her jaw was set in a hard line – the face Shepard made when she was thinking about something. She received a crisp salute from a green ensign, and she gave one in return.

Shepard was just over two meters tall, taller with the added height of her boots, muscular and well built, weighing in at over 100 kilograms in full kit. Her features were all hard lines and sharp angles, and her dark eyes had a penetrating stare. Intimidating on appearance alone, and much more so with the impact of her notoriety. She was the Savior of the Citadel, and she looked like it.

The saluting ensign retreated to a respectful distance.

The side of Shepard’s fist connected with the elevator’s call button with unnecessary force.

The _Normandy_ had swept the Omega nebula for four days now, looking for any sign of the geth holdouts they were sent to eliminate. There was nothing so far, but Shepard still insisted that the ground team be ready to deploy on approach. Sovereign was gone, but the geth network remained intact. The few pockets of resistance they encountered were organized enough to be dangerous. Shepard wanted to maintain the element of surprise as much as she could when dealing with geth, and that meant being ready to go at a moment’s notice.

And therein lay the problem. Joker wasn’t subtle about his disapproval of her presence in his cockpit. His exact words were “helicopter parent,” and “go away.” So she spent the last three days in the cargo hold, staring sullenly at the Mako between assembling and disassembling her equipment.

Her patience was beginning to fray.

In the weeks that followed Sovereign’s attack on the Citadel, the Council sent her up and down every backwater system in the Terminus. Presumably to track down and destroy Saren’s remaining geth forces. No doubt to put as many light years between the new hero of the Citadel and every news crew in the galaxy. Neither the Council nor the Alliance brass particularly enjoyed Shepard’s media presence, since she was never content to open her mouth without firmly inserting her own foot into it. What was the likelihood she’d be able to run her mouth off at al-Jilani in the Terminus? _Wait, no_ , she admonished, _don’t tempt fate._

Escaping from the media shitstorm that formed in the wake of the battle was a tempting prospect, at first. The media song and dance was something that Shepard had no patience for. Never had. She’d spent her fifteen minutes of fame in the aftermath of Akuze in a hospital bed, recently anesthetized and half delirious from pain. She managed to give the press a sound bite her superiors would be happy to see floating around the extranet – something about duty and sacrifice and everyday heroism – but she attributed her success to the opiate derivatives rather than any kind of knack for public speaking. Thankfully there was no follow-up. There were a few blurbs after the memorial went up, but nobody was inclined to ask for her thoughts about it. All of which suited her just fine.

After her appointment as a Spectre there were a few think pieces about humanity’s expanding role in galactic politics, accompanied by a list of her accomplishments and an unflattering post-enlistment photograph. Nothing she couldn’t handle, but things didn’t go smoothly for much longer. Who could forget her disastrous first interview with al-Jilani? The fallout from that was mostly contained within her conservative audience, but Hackett wasn’t pleased. Shepard was just relieved that she didn’t punch al-Jilani in the face. Though the thought crossed her mind… _repeatedly, and with vivid detail_.

But none of this could possibly compare to the sheer scale of her notoriety now. Her face was everywhere. That same damn unflattering post-enlistment photo was now on every screen in the Citadel, COMMANDER SHEPARD scrolling beneath it in every language spoken in the Wards. Her voice echoed in every corridor, endlessly repeating with a confidence she did not feel, “The Reapers are coming. But we killed one of them. We can kill the rest.”

At least all of that was better than the garbage sitting in her inbox, gleefully forwarded to her from Joker. Extranet biopics skirting the truth just enough to bypass copyright law. Speculations about her mental fitness. Conspiracy theories with her at the center of the Council’s machinations. Salacious accounts of her love life _(who is this Commander Shepard and how is she getting laid with such frequency?_ she wondered). Accusations of xenophilia, with varying degrees of vitriol and vulgarity… the list went on. Where Joker got them all she didn’t particularly care to know.

Hunting geth seemed like a welcome distraction. So why was she so anxious to get back?

The elevator chimed, putting an end to that train of thought; but her anxiety lingered. Already she was sidling through the partially opened doors, overwhelmed by a sudden need to check her equipment. Nevermind that yesterday she cleaned, balanced, and calibrated every piece of weaponry she owned. By the time the doors fully opened she was poking impatiently at the controls, urging the elevator down to the shuttle bay.

Taking advantage of the brief reprieve from the crew’s constant respectful attention, she let her body slump against the wall, her head resting on the cool metal of the elevator’s interior. Shepard could hear the hum of the engines even through the walls of the elevator, but still it felt too quiet.

Nobody to shoot the shit with. No cross-species sharing to fill the silence.

_If I had my team –_

Shepard let that thought die on the vine. The fact of the matter was that they weren’t here. They couldn’t stay. She may still be on the Council’s payroll, but none of them were. She shouldn’t begrudge them that.

But there was a lot of distance between ‘should’ and ‘could.’

Only Ashley remained. And she was quite possibly the only thing keeping her sane on this godforsaken campaign to nowhere.

Shepard would never describe Ashley as coy, nor would she ever describe herself as timid. They toyed with each other in the days and weeks before the jump to Ilos, playing a back and forth game of chase. It was fun. More fun than Shepard had in a long time. There were other women before her – some more serious than others – but whatever she and Ashley had felt different. She felt it when they first kissed in Shepard’s quarters on their way to Ilos, the night before they were supposed to die. And she felt it all the times they kissed in the nights after _(in Ashley’s bunk, in Shepard’s quarters, once in the mess hall when no one was around),_ ecstatic just to be alive. No other woman in Shepard’s life could ignite her passion and withstand its intensity the way that Ashley could. Ashley called herself a hellcat, and Shepard burned hot.

But even with Ashley’s company, the _Normandy_ still felt empty without the rest of her team.

Some crew members were happy to see all the aliens go.  Not everyone in the Alliance shared her views about cooperating with aliens. _Hence the ‘loving parody’ spread in Fornax_ , she thought with particular venom.

A single blast from the klaxon over the comm startled her out of her thoughts. “Cruiser of unknown make and origin has locked in an intercept trajectory,” the VI said pleasantly. “Approaching from coordinates –” _An intercept?_ She straightened. _That can’t be –_

The ship banked hard to starboard before Joker’s warning ever registered. Shepard lost her balance and her armored shoulder hit the wall of the elevator. She pushed herself up only to be thrown to the other side as the _Normandy_ reeled beneath her feet.

Beneath the screaming of the klaxon, Shepard could hear the shouts of the crewmen outside. Explosions rocked through the ship, some distant enough that they sounded like dull thuds, others so close Shepard could hear the shearing of the metal bulkheads. She struggled to her feet, half-falling into the elevator doors. The elevator would have locked down after the first hit, so she couldn’t have gotten far. For once she was grateful that the thing was damnably slow.

She jammed her fingers into the seam between the elevator doors, planted her feet and strained to pull it open from the side. The servos in her hardsuit’s exoskeleton whined at the exertion, but with a hiss the hydraulic locks gave and the doors cracked open.

The crew deck was unrecognizable. Everything that wasn’t bolted down was overturned or strewn across the floor. Consoles sputtered and sparked, and their wire guts hung loose from the ceilings and walls. Panels cracked and buckled before exploding out of their settings. Electrical fires bathed everything in an eerie orange light. Shepard could hear the moaning of the bulkheads even under the roar of the overtaxed engines. Crewmen clamored to extinguish fires as the ship literally fell to pieces around them.

“Give me a status report!” She shouted her command in the vague direction of the nearest terminal, but the VI’s answer came from further down the crewdeck. She staggered toward it, all the way past the sleeper pods, riding the ship’s tremors and rolls.

“– integrity is holding at 14%. Kinetic barriers have lost power. Weapon systems are offline. Mass effect core shielding is holding at 31% effective power. Hull breaches detected on decks 1, 2, and 3, sectors –”

Another explosion ripped through the ship, throwing Shepard forward onto the VI’s console.

_This is no geth ship,_ she thought.

“-ccomend immediate disengagement and repair. The nearest Alliance dry dock is located –”

“Give me shipwide comms!” she interrupted.

“Aye, Commander.”

Shepard leaned over the console and shouted into the input to be heard over the chaos around her. “This is Commander Shepard.” Distantly, she could hear the reverberations of her own voice in the other decks. “I’m ordering a general evacuation. Abandon ship. Everyone get to the evac shuttles.” She braced against the console as another explosion shook the deck. “Don’t take any chances. Get in the shuttles and run like hell. Shepard out.”

She directed her next order at the VI console. “Start prepping the distress beacon. Load up any information you can about that cruiser.”

“Aye, Commander.”

Shepard looked over her shoulder and instinctively raised an arm as a panel shot off the wall behind her in a belch of fire. Through the haze, she could see the crewmen running toward the evac shuttles. She refocused on the console, tapping out a hasty message to piggyback on the beacon. Hell if she was going to let this cruiser hit their rescue party.

“Life support systems have failed,” the VI chimed. Shepard sucked in a breath through her teeth and let it out in a curse. She pulled her eyes from the console, and with an efficiency of movement that spoke of hours of practice she slid her helmet over her head and engaged the environmental seals, checking each of them with her fingers. Her visor’s HUD flashed into life, and a stream of information and dozens of environmental warnings filled her vision as a connection was established between it and her hardsuit’s computer. She dismissed the warnings with an impatient flick of her eye and bent back over the console.

“Shepard!”

A little blue dot appeared on her radar. GyC. Williams, A.

“Ash,” she said, without turning to look at her. “Is everyone off the ship?”

“Not yet. There are still some stragglers on the lower decks.”

“All living crewmembers on deck 2 have been evacuated. Enemy fire has rendered the shuttle on deck 3 inoperative. The crew has been diverted to deck 2,” the VI said helpfully.

_Dammit._

“What about the bridge?”

“The bridge shuttle has not been launched.”

_Dammit!_

“Joker’s still in the cockpit, he won’t abandon ship,” Ashley said, by way of explanation. There was heavy silence on the line. “I’m not leaving either.”

“Ashley, listen to me.” She turned to her and put her hands on her shoulders. “I need you to go down to the lower decks and get the crew onto those evac shuttles.” She moved past her to open a locker in the bulkhead. “I’ll take care of Joker.”

“Commander –”

“Ashley, go.” For a moment it looked like Ashley would defy her. Shepard never pulled rank with Ashley, but just this once she used the severe tone she reserved for insubordinate crewmen. “ _Now,_ ” Shepard ordered.

“I…” Ashley’s defiant expression faltered. Shepard could see the turmoil in her eyes. Finally, she answered, “…aye-aye.”

Shepard listened to her retreating footsteps before returning her attention to the open locker. She cleared away the other contents and pulled out a length of nanofiber cable. She attached the magnetic clasp to the back of her hardsuit and slung the coil over her shoulder before turning back toward the burning crewdeck.

“Launch the beacon,” she ordered.

“Aye, Commander. Beacon has been launched.”

“Okay,” she breathed, more for her own benefit than the VI’s. “Let’s go get Joker.”

The _Normandy_ shuddered beneath her feet, struggling to maintain a steady course as systems continued to go offline. Joker was still on the comm, broadcasting a desperate mayday. She set her teeth as another panel burst out of its frame only a few centimeters in front of her.

She sprinted the rest of the way across the crewdeck and up the stairs to the CIC. With each step up the stairs she could feel the mass effect fields that generated the a-grav grow weaker.

“Commander, deck 1 has lost environmental functioning. Opening this door will depressurize this compartment,” the VI spoke into her ear.

“Has Chief Williams gotten everyone off the ship?

“She and the remaining crew have been evacuated.”

“Well.” She shrugged off the coil of cable, looping it around the railing on the most secure-looking bulkhead. “That would make this a one-way trip, then. Override and open the doors.”

“Aye, Commander.”

There was a hiss of hydraulics, a roar of rushing air, and then nothing at all as the last of the ship’s atmo rushed into space. The deck was plunged into darkness as all of the fires were extinguished. Only a sliver of light from the crack in the doors illuminated the dim stairwell. In the silence of vacuum, her ragged breathing filled her ears, too loud. She slid her fingers into the crack in the door. It parted easily, and soon the sliver widened into a wall of light. For a moment, she was blinded.

It took her visor all of a second to polarize. Shepard blinked hard to try and clear her vision of artifacts and was only semi successful. The planet above was a mass of harsh white light, filling the shattered remains of the CIC with twisted shadows. She braced herself against the doors and planted her feet firmly on the floor. Her whole body wound tight as a spring, and then released as she propelled herself forward through the door and into the wreckage.

Reaching out to take a hold of the railing that once surrounded the galaxy map, she pulled herself flush to the bank of central consoles. Hand over hand she climbed over the ruined consoles, letting the cable unwind behind her. Her vision narrowed to the next handhold, her mind settled into an unnerving quiet. Instinct would guide her.

When she reached the end of the bank of terminals, she disengaged the magnetic seal and reeled the cable in, re-securing the clamp before kicking off toward the cockpit and letting inertia carry her the rest of the way.

A flickering mass effect field partitioned the cockpit from the rest of the CIC, holding in what little atmo was left on the deck. She slipped through the field and was immediately assaulted by the roar of the collapsing ship. She reached out a hand to catch the back of the pilot’s seat. “Joker,” she called, “we have to go.”

He didn’t answer her. His hands were still moving over the haptic interface, faster than she’d ever seen. She touched his shoulder. “Joker –”

“No!” The sound exploded out of him, but his wide eyes were still fixed on his console “I won’t abandon the _Normandy!_ I can still save her!” The color drained from his face. “I can still –”

Over her shoulder, she could see the cruiser looming. It was massive. It looked more like a small asteroid than any kind of ship she’d ever seen. There was a point of light growing at its bow, a spot of orange that grew into a beam. In the pocket of atmo, she could hear the scream of metal shearing as the beam cut through the deck behind her.

Suddenly the knife strapped to her thigh was in her hand, and before Joker could protest she sliced evenly through the straps of his flight harness. Her fist closed around his thin arm and she hauled him out of the chair. His scream of pain barely registered, but the unpleasant give of bone breaking under her fingers did. She wrapped an arm around his middle and kicked off toward the bridge’s small four person shuttle.

She had only just settled him into a seat – _like a toddler,_ she thought inanely – when she turned her head upward just in time to see the growing light from the cruiser. The beam cut through the armor, the hull, and then through her outstretched arm before it punched a hole through the deck beneath her feet.

Her armor boiled away almost instantly. Shepard felt searing pain and then, more disturbingly, nothing at all. She must have cried out, but she couldn’t recall. All she could remember hearing was the rush of blood in her ears as she was thrown across the cockpit.

Her back hit the wall. She felt something shatter. With her good arm, she grabbed a fistful of hanging wires. She tried to push off with her legs and found that she couldn’t.

“Launch the shuttle!” she screamed.

“Commander –” the VI began.

“I said launch the fucking shuttle!”

She caught a glimpse of Joker’s face as the shuttle doors closed. _God, he’ll never forgive me for this._ But the mass effect partition flickered and died just as the shuttle launched. _See that you fucking idiot? You’d be boiling right now if I hadn’t –_

The mass effect core blew, sending a wave of energy through the wrecked ship. Shepard felt the familiar sizzle of the eezo in her nerves, the humming in her ears. The sizzle grew to a burn, and the hum to a roar as the wave passed over her. Her body was thrown clear of the wreck from the force of it.

She was tumbling end over end when she came to, her hand reaching and grasping into the darkness of space. The wreckage of the _Normandy_ fell around her, flaring alight as the pieces hit the planet’s atmosphere.

_Alchera._ The word was caught in the forefront of her thoughts. _The planet is called Alchera. Alchera._

Her face turned toward the planet, and even through her polarized visor she was stunned by its brilliance. Her vision was filled with the sight of it. She was falling toward it, falling into the expanse of searing light.

The pain in her lungs felt like fire. That light grew all around her, found its way inside her, and it set her aflame.

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Cosmos, Carl Sagan
> 
> AN: I love ME and I love hard sci fi. I’m attempting to infuse some of my love of science into the existing game, as well as a new take on the events of the game rather than a word-for-word retelling. I hope it's an interesting change!


	2. the stars walk backward

_She dreams of the ocean._

_She dreams she is standing on the edge of it, her feet bare in the sand. Her boots are dangling by their laces on her finger and then she lets them fall just beyond the water’s reach. She takes a step and the cold waves lap over her toes. Her skin prickles but she doesn’t move, just lets the ocean wash over her until her skin is numb. Someone is calling her name and the sound urges her to hurry. She keeps walking until the waves are climbing her thighs, soaking her denim jeans._

_She lifts her gaze up to the horizon where the ocean meets the sky. It’s so smooth she cannot see where one ends and one begins. She realizes that the waves have stopped coming, and the ocean has gone completely still. She can see every star reflected in its surface._

_Someone is calling her name and she knows she needs to go. The ocean is rising around her and the stars are growing brighter. Every step sends a ripple through the smooth surface of the water, causing the stars to flicker like candle flames. The water is at her breast now and it’s so cold._

_The ocean floor goes out beneath her on her next step and she throws her head back as she falls. The stars have set the sky afire, scorching away the darkness. She watches the sky split and blister and watches the flames spread until there’s no darkness left at all. It’s just an endless expanse of blazing white, swallowing everything._

_Someone is calling her name, but she’s gone. The ocean sinks into her clothes, into her skin, into her lungs. It hurts so much, but she’s gone. She’s gone._

_She’s drowning, and it feels so much like crying._

_She feels a hand on the back of her neck. It grabs a fistful of her collar and pulls. The water swirls around them both and the waves have returned with all the fury of the ocean. She breaks the surface and the air is so cold on her skin. Her mouth opens and she’s choking, coughing hard until the water runs out of her mouth and down her face._

_She’s gasping, she’s breathing –_

“Oh my god, Miranda. I think she’s waking up.”

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> dive for dreams, e.e. cummings


	3. dying is an art like everything else

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> When Shepard wakes, it is in the wreckage of a body she once knew. Desperate for answers, she must escape the facility that held her and find the people that revived her.
> 
> Content warnings for medical horror, body horror, and graphic violence.

Shepard awoke with a sickening sense of dread.

The sound of her own breathing was loud in her ears, deep and even. The unease she felt was pushing her to stir, but her mind was still slow with sleep. Her eyes creaked open and then shut tight against the stinging light in her face. Everything was too bright, and it hurt. She was reminded of that blazing white expanse from her dream.

_Alchera._

The word passed through her hazy thoughts, but it meant nothing to her.

Like falling from a great height, that sense of apprehension kept growing.

She kept her eyes closed and tried to listen.

An electric hum filled the entire room, and even when she concentrated she couldn’t pinpoint any single source of the sound. Distantly, she could hear the electronic stutter of a computer. A pneumatic wheeze punctuated the electric droning and the rhythmic _thud_ of her heartbeat.

She forced her eyes open again.

A dozen robotic arms were suspended above her, a tangle of limbs all emerging from a wide nested dome. To her side she could see the thin, snaking tubing of four separate intravenous drips, each inserted into a different part of her arm.

_A hospital?_

There were a few machines crowded around her, but the rest of the room was largely empty. A window that looked into a darkened room was set into the wall to her right. For observation, if this was a surgical suite as she was beginning to suspect. The wall to her left was dominated by a bank of consoles, showing the status of the machines as well as her vitals. And in the center – she felt her breath hitch when she saw it – there was an overhead view of her naked body, lying restrained on the operating table.

Her head was shaved – only a few weeks ago, judging by the length of her hair. The gaunt lines of her face and her sunken eyes gave her the impression that she was here for much longer than that. Even beneath the soft layer of new growth she could see the lines of scars on her scalp. The faded marks of microincisions cobwebbed across her abdomen, intersecting with the harsh parallel lines of her protruding ribs. Her limbs were branded with long, fresh scars that branched and narrowed to follow the curve of her fingers and toes – the exception being her right arm, which was a mottled patchwork of pale skin and raw tissue.

That feeling of dread grew into tightly wound fear.

Shepard flexed her fingers and then curled them into a tight fist. She tested the restraints. Sturdy metal, locked together with a magnetic clasp. Designed to withstand the struggling of an uncooperative patient, she thought with gritted teeth. The release was probably somewhere in the observation room. She craned her neck to look through the window, but the room was still dark.

The whirring sound of the surgical suite kicking into life made her head snap back.

Above her, the arms were twitching and stirring. She could hear the servos whining as their motions smoothed, arranging themselves around her like curious bystanders. Their metal fixtures caught the light as they moved, flashing rapidly under the harsh surgical lights. Her eyes darted to the bank of consoles on the opposite wall.

SURGERY, GENERAL: EXPLORATORY  
INITIALIZING >>>  
STANDBY >>>

All of that fear hit her now and she was thrashing against the restraints, her fists beating the table in time. Every impact of her wrists against the metal cuffs sent shockwaves of pain up her arms, and with each successive strike she expected to hear the cracking of bone, but it never came.

One of the armatures swiveled toward her and paused over her face as if to contemplate her terror. Its mounted blade was small, but Shepard knew it was sharp enough to eviscerate her. Its mate joined it with a hum. As the sonic scalpel powered up, the electric humming turned into a high pitched scream.

The pair slid on their tracks to hover over her chest, the first arm lowering itself into a ready position. Shepard’s neck strained as she arched her back, the shackle digging into her hand as she tried to pull herself free.

She bit back a scream as the knife sliced her skin.

She felt the sizzling in her nerves before she saw the biotic flash, accelerating her fist through the restraint and toward the robotic armature. The arm wriggled under her grasp, sliding through her sweat-slicked fingers. Its blade bit into her palm, but she set her teeth and lunged for it again. Her short nails found purchase on the smooth casing, and with all of the strength she could muster she wrenched the armature from its socket, leaving behind a tangle of sparking wires. An alarm began to sound and the rest of the arms retreated.

After she managed to crack open the other shackle, she fumbled with the cuffs at her ankles. Unable to wedge her fingers into the seams, she kicked hard until the seals gave.

A graceless roll off the table left her sprawled on the cold floor, tangled in her IV wires. When she tried to stand, she fell helplessly back to the ground. She lay panting on the tiled floor, her nervous system buzzing and muscles burning from the sudden exertion.

As she raised herself on trembling arms her wounded hand left a smear of blood on the immaculate floor.

_Shit._

She lifted her head toward the other room. There was an aid station near the door.

Wobbling dangerously, she managed to cross the room with her IV stand in tow. Her hands shook as she fumbled with the aid station’s plastic catch. There was no care or forethought in the way she rifled through the station’s contents, pushing aside the analgesics and antihistamines until they clattered to the ground. When she’d found what she was looking for she sank to the floor again, her back propped against the wall.

The plastic packaging rattled in her hands as she tore it open with her teeth. Grunting with pain, Shepard pressed the blunted tip of the applicator into her wound and squeezed the release. The medigel spread easily across her palm before becoming tacky on her fingers.

Much as she relished the thought of beating her captors to death with her IV stand, she couldn’t afford to haul it around. Shepard was sure her combat medicine instructor would probably roll over in his grave if he knew what she was about to do, but she did it anyway. Trying and failing to steady her hands, she gingerly removed her IV with a gauze pad. Then, pressing two fingers to her arm with as much pressure her tired muscles could generate, she spread more medigel over the wound. She repeated the process – slowly, methodically – three more times, leaving four dangling tubes hanging from the stand. Never one to take chances, she bound the wounds with the roll of gauze bandages in her lap. Bleeding out after tearing out an IV would only be marginally better than an automated vivisection.

Leaning heavily on the aid station, Shepard pulled herself upright. When she tried the door, it was locked.

_Of course._

She scanned the room for another exit and her eyes fell on the darkened window. Before she was even fully aware of what she was doing she had the IV stand in both hands, raised over her shoulder. Cracks shot out and across the glass from the force of her first blow. She reeled but managed to stay upright. She raised the metal stand and brought it down again. The window buckled, but didn’t break. She raised it again. Her arms shuddered with the effort and her muscles were screaming beneath the roaring in her ears. She lost her grip on the stand as it crashed through the pane of glass and into the observation room beyond.

Stepping around the stray shards of glass on the floor, Shepard peered into the next room. Beneath the window she just smashed was a bench filled with powered down consoles. From her vantage point in the surgical suite, the only way in or out of the room was an elevator on the far side.

Shepard contemplated her bare skin and grimaced. There was a fine coating of glass spread over the lab bench and most of the floor. Using what was left of the gauze bandages, she wrapped her hands and feet, then swept the IV stand along the bottom edge of the window, clearing as much of the broken glass as she could before testing the surface with her wrapped hand. 

After the herculean effort to free herself, it was a challenge just climbing that one meter through the window. When her legs felt like giving out, she let herself fall over the edge, rolling across the bench and onto the floor of the next room.

Ignoring the flashes of pain on her arms and legs where the glass bit into her skin, she staggered back to her feet and picked her way across the room through the broken glass.

There were a few vents pumping cool air into the room, but all of them looked too small to climb through. And if that elevator really was the only way out of this lab, she could hazard a guess and say that those vents went directly up to the surface of this godforsaken facility. Shepard doubted she had the strength to climb through another window, let alone straight up through a vent.

Though the element of surprise was undoubtedly lost, considering the smashed window and the low alarms still blaring in the other room, Shepard took position on the side of the elevator, out of sight. She hit the call button and waited.

The doors slid open, spilling warm light into the darkened room. Shepard tensed. She counted to ten before she rounded the corner, raising her fists.

The only occupant was a corpse, propped up against the wall and framed by a smear of its own blood.

Shepard edged around the pooling blood and crouched to examine it. Judging from the uniform and the gun on his hip, she guessed the man must have worked security. He’d taken two, three shots before going down, but his sidearm was still holstered. She removed it and checked the heat sink – never fired.

A burst of static made her jump, almost losing her balance. Her dark eyes flicked to the radio pinned to the guard’s shoulder. A woman’s voice, thickly accented and tinny over the comm, addressed the dead guard: “- cility has been compromised… mechs… mal… ning. Converge on … position. Lazarus is all that matters.”

There was the sound of gunfire and another burst of static and then the line went dead.

_What the fuck is Lazarus?_

Shepard took the guard’s gun. The familiar weight in her hand was a comfort, but only a small one. Shepard wasn’t going to kid herself. In this state, any firefight would end with her dead.

Shepard hit the button for the mezzanine and then slumped against the elevator wall. The ride was long and unnaturally quiet. The doors opened to a security checkpoint that was previously manned by two guards. The first was collapsed backwards over his chair; the second was sprawled on the floor. Neither had drawn their weapons, though it looked like the second made some kind of attempt. The first had three wounds in his chest, visible through his blood-soaked shirt, but the wounds were spread wide. Whoever shot him did it with an unsteady hand.

Someone killed at least three guards to access the surgical suite she nearly died in. That didn’t seem like coincidence. But the guards didn’t put up any kind of resistance, which meant that it must have been someone familiar, someone they didn’t expect.

 _I need to get the fuck out of here_.

She crept through the halls of the facility on unsteady legs, her ears ringing in the silence. For a facility under attack, it was far too quiet. At every corner she expected something to accost her. Mechs, the remaining security forces, anything. But nothing came. It only unnerved her further.

Following the serpentine hallways brought her to what appeared to be the center of the facility: a large anteroom dominated by a reinforced glass wall that looked out into the darkness of space. The crumbling landscape of an icy asteroid spread out beneath the cold, distant light of the stars. The sight made a chill run down her spine, though she wasn’t sure why.

Shepard had woken up in an underground lab contained in a facility that was built into the surface of an asteroid. Someone, somewhere, had a vested interest in keeping her – and whatever it was they did to her – a secret. Her grip on the pistol tightened. Whoever they were, they’d be giving her answers through a mouthful of broken teeth when Shepard found them.

The pneumatic breath of a door opening made her duck clumsily back into the hallway she came from. She listened to the heavy footfalls as they tracked across the anteroom. Shepard leaned out of cover in time to see the door to one of the facility’s branching hallways close behind a retreating figure.

Shepard’s plan hadn’t developed much farther than “escape” and “don’t die.” Tailing the survivor and hoping they led her to an evac zone sounded like a better plan than wandering the facility until she ran into a mech patrol. The adrenaline rose in her blood as she followed the figure.

She padded silently through the hall on wrapped feet. The floor was cool to the touch, and suddenly Shepard was aware of the gooseflesh rising on her bare skin. Silence was heavy in the air, the darkness growing deeper as Shepard moved through the empty hallways, leaning heavily on the walls for support. She passed half a dozen darkened labs, some in disarray and some so pristine it was like they’d never been used.

Ahead, she could see the orange glow of a haptic interface. Shepard crept around the corner, gripping the pistol with white knuckles, and slipped into the open lab.

A man was hunched over a console on the other side, tapping at the holo interface and cursing under his breath. His bald white head gleamed in the light of the console and Shepard couldn’t help but be reminded of her endless days of spit-and-polish in the corps. There was a pistol on the bench beside him.

She pressed the barrel of her gun into the man’s back and his whole body jolted in answer.

“Turn around.” The sound of her own voice surprised her. It was low and quiet, hoarse from disuse. When the man did not immediately respond, she pressed the gun insistently into his back. “ _Now.”_

He turned. When he saw her, his shock was clear on his face. It was not an unreasonable reaction. Shepard looked like death, and she was naked as the day she was born. His mustache twitched as he searched for the words his mouth was trying to form.

“Shepard? You’re alive? But… how?”

“Your guess is as good as mine. Actually,” Shepard cocked the pistol with a satisfying click, “I’m betting your guess is gonna be a lot better than mine.”

“I – I don’t know anything! I thought you were already dead! The mechs were shooting so I just ran! Please! I swear to God I don’t know anything!”

She interrupted his pleading. “Where am I?”

“In the Terminus! We’re – God, I don’t know – half a day away from Omega?”

_Omega? What the fuck am I doing in the Terminus?_

“What happened?”

“Someone…” He swallowed hard. “Someone hacked into the station’s security mainframe.” His eyes darted toward the door then back to the gun pointed at his chest. “All the mechs went crazy, they started shooting everyone. I had to run!”

“Why?” Her voice was sharp. “Why would they attack this facility?”

The man’s eyes were wide when he met her harsh gaze. The answer seemed obvious. “To kill you.”

Shepard sucked in a breath through her teeth. _Of course._

“Why do they want to kill me _?_ ”

“I don’t know! I was just a medical tech, I had nothing to do with the politics!”

“Bullshit. I think you do know.” She thought of the sonic scalpel, screaming in anticipation of her exposed bone. She thought of all her scars, spread over her abdomen like cracks in a window pane. She thought of the raw, angry flesh of her mottled right arm. She thought of her hollow cheeks and of the time she lost. The questions were burning within her, buoyed up by the heat of her anger.

“I think you know _exactly_ why they want to kill me. Is it because of something you did to me? Something I’m not supposed to know about? _Why?”_

She was crowding him into the console now, and the man shriveled under her gaze. His eyes flicked to the pistol on the bench. Shepard grabbed a fistful of his shirt and hauled him forward. He raised his hands, and as the barrel of the gun pushed into his throat he made a horrified little noise. “I said: _why do they want to kill me?”_

_“I swear to God I don’t know!”_

The door opened and Shepard heard another man’s voice. “Wilson!” it called. Yanking him by the collar, Shepard pulled the tech away from the console and between her and the door. Her arm went around his neck and tightened like a noose. The pistol went to his head, and the barrel dug unrelentingly into his temple.

 _“Jacob. Help,”_ her hostage choked out.

The console threw orange light over his figure: tall and broad shouldered, with dark skin and strong features. Shepard knew from the way he moved – gun raised, no wasted movement – that he was military. In the light, she could see the recognition appear in the arch of his heavy brows. “Shepard,” he said, and lowered his weapon.

“Who are you?” she called out in as steady a voice as she could manage.

“My name is Jacob Taylor.” The man was edging closer to her. His gun was still lowered, but his eyes never left hers. “I’m the chief security officer of this facility. I’m here to help you.”

“Yeah? Good fucking work on that one.”

“This facility is compromised,” he continued, undeterred. “We need to get you out of here.”

Her hostage sucked in a gasp as the gun pushed mercilessly against his temple. “I’m not going anywhere until I get some answers!” she spat.

“Jacob,” he gasped. “She’s crazy. She’s not Shepard.”

“The _fuck_ do you mean I’m not Shepard?”

“She’s going to shoot me, Jacob!” He sounded hysterical.

“You expect me to just put a bullet in her head, Wilson? I’m not doing that.” The man raised his hands, pointing the gun to the ceiling. His dark eyes didn’t move from hers as he removed the thermal clip from his pistol and let it clatter to the ground between them. The tech groaned pathetically. “Like I said, we’re here to help you, Shepard.”

There was a long silence, broken only by the sound of Shepard’s ragged breathing. There was a subtle shake in the hand that held the pistol to Wilson’s head and her chest brushed against his back with every inhale. Her strength was beginning to fail. But it couldn’t end here. Not now. Not before she asked the question that was burning like bile in the pit of her stomach.

“What did you do to me?”

“Ask him.” He inclined his head toward the man in her grasp. “Wilson was our chief medical tech. If you let him go I’m sure he’ll tell you everything.”

 _“Chief_ medical tech, huh?” Her captive made a strangled noise around her arm, but she didn’t ease her hold. “You were lying to me, Wilson.” He clawed at her arm, trying to break free. “ _Now tell me what you did.”_

_“Jacob!”_

“She deserves to know, Wilson.”

_“Tell me what you did to me!”_

Wilson’s bald head was turning scarlet in her chokehold, beads of perspiration standing out against his shiny forehead. He shouted out his answer. _“We brought you back!”_

“Back? From where?” She got no reply from Wilson, who was gasping quite pitifully now. “ _Where?”_

It was Jacob who answered her, in a somber tone tinged with something that could have been sympathy. “From the dead, Shepard.”

Her grip on Wilson’s neck slackened.

“Dead.” Her voice cracked when she said it.

“The _Normandy_ was attacked by an unknown enemy in the Amada system. You were killed, and the ship was destroyed over –”

“Alchera,” she finished.

“That’s right,” he said quietly.

“My crew… what happened to my crew?”

“They’re safe. There were a few crewmen who didn’t survive the initial attack, but everyone else made it out okay.”

“And…” Shepard thought of the look on Ashley’s face when she ordered her to leave. Afraid. Afraid and hurt. Shepard would never forgive herself if her turned back was the last of her Ashley had ever seen.  “…and Ashley Williams?”

“She’s safe,” Jacob answered.

Relief washed over her in a wave. It was short lived.

“Does the Alliance know I’m alive?” Shepard asked.

“We are Alliance.”

“Don’t fuck with me, Jacob.” Her voice was low and threatening, little more than a growl.

“I’m not lying to you, Shepard.”

“That’s _bullshit!”_ she spat back. “The Alliance doesn’t operate in the Terminus, so you better tell me who the _fuck_ you are!”

“We brought you back from the dead, Shepard. You really think whoever killed you wouldn’t try again? We did what we could to keep you safe. This facility was top of the line, highly classified. And now it’s gone to shit.”

There was another long pause as Shepard considered what Jacob said. Her hand was visibly shaking now, and her legs were numb with fatigue. “I don’t believe you,” she whispered.

“Put the gun down, Shepard.” Jacob was moving toward her now, slowly, his hands upraised. “We can all walk out of here if you just let Wilson go.”

Shepard ground the muzzle of the gun into Wilson’s temple and the loud, despairing moan he let out in response made Jacob stop midstep. “How can I trust you?”

The question was still hanging heavy in the air when the door opened. Shepard heard the sound of her boots as the woman’s figure crossed the lab. And just for a moment, as she stepped into the light of the console, Shepard saw the distaste on her lips before the woman raised the gun in her hand and fired.

Wilson’s blood spattered across her face and poured down the front of her bare chest. His body went limp against her and they both toppled to the ground. Dazed, she managed to roll Wilson’s body off of her before trying and failing to stand.

Jacob was shouting. “Miranda! What are you _doing –”_

The woman cut him off. “My job. Wilson was compromised, he betrayed us all.”

Jacob said nothing in reply. He stepped over Wilson’s crumpled body and moved to where Shepard lay, panting and trembling. She jerked away from his touch, reeling on her hands and knees.

“Taking hostages Shepard? That’s not like you.” The woman’s voice was low and thickly accented. Shepard recognized it as the voice she heard on the dead guard’s radio. Lifting her eyes to look past Jacob’s crouching form, she saw that the woman holstered her pistol and was now regarding her coolly from across the room. Her hair was long and dark, her skin pale, and her blue eyes were bright and watchful.

A snarl split Shepard’s lips. “What the _fuck_ do you know about me?”

The woman gave her a knowing smile. “More than you think.”

She turned toward the door. “We need to get out of here before they realize their operation has failed.” The woman spoke with an air of command that was effortless and cold, just like the way she’d shot her colleague. Ruthless and efficient. “They might send someone to make sure you’re really dead this time.”

“And what makes you think I’ll come with you?”

The woman stopped in the doorway, then answered over her shoulder. “Because you have questions, and I have answers.”

“I was asking him questions.” She gave a feeble nod at Wilson’s body. “You killed him before he could answer any of them.”

“I’ve spent two years of my life bringing you back from the dead, Shepard.” The woman matched her gaze. “I’m not about to shoot you in the back now.”

“Two –” Shepard felt all the breath leave her body with the force of a heavy blow. The floor lurched beneath her hands. “Did you… did you say two years?”

“Like I said, Shepard. You have questions, and I have answers.”

A savage fury rose in her. What she would have given to have her strength back. What she would have done to get her answers. Her hands balled into fists on the ground beneath her shaking arms. In a gesture of familiarity – all too out of place – Jacob put a hand on her shoulder. Shepard jerked away from his touch and nearly fell prone into the spreading pool of Wilson’s blood. Only Jacob’s steadying hold on her arm kept her upright. Shepard wrenched violently in his grip, expending the very last of her body’s strength. She hung off his arm, panting with exertion, and let out a low, frustrated noise.

“Shepard,” he said. The gentleness of his tone surprised her. “You have my word that no one’s going to hurt you.” She heard the jingling of metal, and then Jacob offered her his other hand. In his palm, she saw a set of dog tags, shining in the light of the console. “Soldier to soldier.”

They were Alliance.

But why? Why would the Alliance bring her back? Why would they keep her return a secret?

_None of this makes any fucking sense._

There was a long moment between them, the silence unbroken save for Shepard’s heavy breathing. After a while, she let her head hang low and her arm went limp in his grip. Jacob pulled her to her feet and slung her arm over his broad shoulders. Together, they hobbled out of the lab.

The woman – Miranda – stood in the doorway, waiting. Shepard lifted her head to look at her.

“You’re gonna tell me everything,” she said.

Miranda’s cold gaze was unwavering. “Yes, Shepard. I’ll tell you everything.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Lady Lazarus, Sylvia Plath
> 
> AN: I'm going for a reinterpretation of the events of the game. Rather than tell the story over again, I wanted to shift the world into this AU while still maintaining the spirit of the game. I'm having a lot of fun writing it, so I hope it's a fun new take to read as well!


	4. timshel

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Following her harrowing escape, Shepard has questions but nobody seems to have answers. When the time comes for her to meet the illusive man behind her revival, Shepard is ready for answers. But she is unprepared for the question he has for her.
> 
> Content warnings for body horror, medical horror, self harm, and suicide.

Even over the growling guitars and booming bass playing through the old analog earphones, Shepard could hear her blood pounding in her ears. She kept her breathing tightly controlled, even breaths in and out. Her footfalls were just as deliberate. Her gaze never wavered from the track ahead of her, maintaining an intensity of focus that consumed her thoughts. Every step was made with purpose, with precision. She felt every shifting muscle, every point of pressure as she ran. She pushed her weight into the ground and felt the way it pushed back. First with her heel, and then rolling forward onto the balls of her feet. She sprang forward on her toes and caught herself on the heel of the opposite foot. The music was still blaring in her ears, but it’s her footfalls that had her full attention. It kept her focused, kept her grounded.

As Shepard rounded the track, she caught sight of Jacob watching her. His arms were crossed over his chest and his heavy brows were knit together in thought. As always, his beard and mustache were impeccably trimmed.  Shepard collapsed not long after their confrontation and woke up slung over his broad shoulders in a fireman’s carry. He hadn’t been far from her since. While he was chief security officer on the Lazarus Project, he was charged with coordinating Shepard’s personal security on the station. A glorified bodyguard, really.

She let her eyes slide past him and picked up her pace.

It took her a week to be able to walk again. Two more to be able to run. After her harrowing escape, it was remarkable she was able to move at all. She was scheduled to wake the day of the attack, but there would have been weeks of physical therapy and neurological testing between waking and actually moving. The Lazarus Project had no other subjects. No one was really sure how Shepard’s body would handle the strain of her new… parts.

_As it turns out, fear is a powerful motivator._

Miranda assured her that she was doing well. That setbacks were “to be expected.” Shepard wasn’t sure what kind of setbacks she should expect, considering Miranda shot the man who rebuilt her.

She shook her head. _Rebuilt._

Anything that wasn’t destroyed had been restored, and anything that was had been replaced. And everything was improved.

Her shattered skeleton was reconstructed and augmented, a fusion of titanium and bone. Her biotic amp was upgraded and her nerves stripped and re-myelinated. Her muscles were incubated and regrown in a chemical bath. Her organs were cloned and replaced, free of the wounds of her ill spent youth. Hell, they even gave her new _skin_. The scars on her knuckles, the cigarette burns on her wrists, the tattoos on her arm, even the freckles on her shoulders – all of it was gone. Replaced by a sanitized spread of lab grown flesh, marked with scars that ran along her limbs like seams on stockings. Save for the mottled skin and raw flesh that was her right arm.

It was hard not to feel like an incomplete imitation of the person she once was.

When Shepard rounded the track again Jacob was still there. He jerked his head, beckoning her over. His mouth was moving as she slowed her pace. She pulled the buds from her ears. “What was that?”

“I said you’re looking good out there, Shepard.”

“Yeah? In N School I had to do twice that distance in half the time.” She passed a hand over her brow, letting it hover over her eyes before it fell back down to her side.

“I know you’re frustrated, but it’ll come to you.” He tried to sound encouraging.

“See but that’s the thing. It’s all in my head, I remember it. I just… I just can’t fucking _do_ it.”

The recovery team found her brain in excellent condition. Better than they dared to hope for, considering the circumstances of Shepard’s gruesome demise. Her memories, her experiences, they were all still there. The weeks she spent answering questions about her elementary school teachers and N school classmates confirmed it, but her body had been remade. Every motion was unfamiliar and every sensation felt alien. “It will take time,” Miranda said, her cold gaze steady, “for your brain and your body to synchronize.”

The word “synchronize” sounded much more dignified than the reality. Her first steps were as unsteady as a toddler’s. Her first venture out of bed ended with her sprawled in a heap on the floor. One of her first exercises was a simple game of catch that began with her taking a foam ball to the face and ended with her instructor nursing a black eye. She tore pages out of books and shattered glasses in her hand. Eating was humiliating. Miranda forbade her from attempting to use her biotics, and with good reason. If not for the titanium mesh reinforcing her bones, Shepard would have easily broken her own arm the first time she defied her.

Jacob looked sympathetic. Shepard brushed past him, moving to her things.

“You got something to say? Or are you just here for moral support?” She lifted a water bottle to her lips.

“The Director wants to speak with you.” Shepard lowered the bottle and looked at him over the rim. “You’re stable. And from what we can tell, you’re the real deal, Shepard. It’s about time you got some answers from the man in charge.” He stood at attention, suddenly all military professionalism. “He’ll be calling through the QEC at 0500 hours Earth Standard. I have orders to make sure you’re ready.”

“The Director wants to speak to me. Personally?” She said, incredulous.

“Yes ma’am.”

“Well,” Shepard said over her shoulder as she turned to leave. “Guess I better freshen up then, huh?”

Jacob didn’t follow and Shepard gave thanks for small miracles.

Shepard set a quick pace to her quarters. The path was familiar and her feet followed it without guidance. She hadn’t ventured beyond her quarters and the gymnasium since her first unsteady steps outside of the medical bay. There was little else to do other than train. Extranet signals were blocked on the station and her caretakers didn’t give her an omnitool.

Jacob delivered a stack of bound paper books to her quarters in the first week, and even that was a surprise.

“You don’t think I’ll beat my guard to death with one of these?” she asked, thumbing through the one he tossed to her.

“Nah. If these were hardcover I might reconsider,” he said, in his oddly familiar way.

But the books were written centuries ago. Nothing that could clue her in to what happened in the two years she spent dead. It didn’t stop her from reading them all, though.

She passed a few of the researchers on the way but none of them so much as looked at her. Probably under orders not to speak with her lest they give her any kind of privileged information. She gave up on trying to talk with them long ago, so she moved past them and entered her quarters.

On interplanetary installations like this one, space was always at a premium. Yet when she was released from the medical bay Shepard was led to a rather spacious private cabin on the main deck. The space was unfamiliar, missing the small details that made her old cabin a home: her favorite worn out leather jacket, the little gadgets Tali crafted for her from recovered scrap, the antique star charts her father gave her before he died. All of it was incinerated above Alchera.

Shepard peeled off her sweaty clothes as she strode across the cabin on her way to the bathroom, averting her eyes from the mirror above the metal sink.

Her right arm was a patchwork horror of titanium bone and synthetic muscle, grafted skin stretched taught over the inhuman armature. Of everything, it was what disturbed her most. Her arm was utterly destroyed during the attack, severed at the shoulder. It wasn’t recovered. The thought of it floating disembodied over Alchera, spinning lazily in an endless pantomime, was enough to make her stomach turn.

When she stepped into the shower the cold water on her face made her gasp. She turned from the spray and let the water roll down her shoulders and the backs of her legs.  Her skin prickled, and a shiver ran through her whole body. She let the cold sink into her overtaxed muscles and then groped for the shower handle.

She passed a hand through her hair, more out of habit than anything else. It was little more than two centimeters long, shaved off when the scientists went exploring in her brain. “Only to assess your faculties,” Miranda assured her. Shepard wasn’t sure how much of Miranda’s assurances could be believed. She was willing enough to answer her questions, but there was nothing that she could compare Miranda’s answers to. Her own crude examination of her body and the limited access she was given to her files only supported what Miranda told her.

Jacob didn’t lie to her when he said they were part of the Alliance. Project Lazarus was under the jurisdiction of the Directorate of Military Intelligence and Homeland Security. Homeland, in the vernacular. If the Marine Corps and the Navy were the sword and shield of the Alliance, Homeland was the dagger behind its back. Initially formed as a safeguard against a colonist revolt, Homeland found new purpose during the First Contact War. It was a team from Homeland that liberated Shanxi.

Shepard’s time in the Special Forces gave her limited contact with Homeland, primarily through their anti-piracy efforts in the Verge. But she didn’t know much. Only enough to know to stay the hell out of their way – nothing that would enlighten her to as to why they chose her, of all people, to bring back. She was a jarhead. A top notch fucking jarhead, but still. They could have raised a small army with the credits they spent on a single soldier.

“I don’t know why.” Miranda answered, and for once Shepard was inclined to believe her. “It was my job to make sure Project Lazarus succeeded. I’ve done that, now the rest is between you and the Director.”

It seemed like it was about damn time she got some answers.

Shepard dressed in a set of clean Alliance blues, grimacing in the mirror as she did so. She unrolled her sleeves to cover her mottled right arm and the long pants covered her mutilated legs. Six weeks of solid food had fleshed out her face but the color hadn’t returned entirely to her cheeks. Her skin was pallid, drained of the warm golden hue she acquired from years spent in the suns of distant worlds. She could cover the scars on her body, but nothing could cover the harrowed look in her eyes or the pain etched into the lines of her face.

When she opened the door to her quarters she was only mildly surprised to find Jacob waiting for her. He stood up straighter and saluted. She gave one in return, though she wasn’t sure how appropriate the gesture was. She didn’t remember any kind of protocol regarding the maintenance of rank after death.

“The QEC is on the upper deck,” he said. The “you need my clearance to get there _”_ remained unspoken. She moved past him toward the elevators.

“Alright. Let’s go meet your boss.”

He keyed in his access code and then settled into an at ease position beside her. She did the same, without thinking about it. She glanced over at him and then back to the door as the elevator began to move.

“You don’t strike me as the Homeland type, Mr. Taylor.”

“I wasn’t always with Homeland. I started out as a marine, like you.” He looked at her and she met his gaze with an even expression. “A lot of us are ex-military. People who wanted to make a difference after the war.”

“Yeah? You weren’t making a difference as a marine?”

“Sitting with my thumb up my ass waiting for the Reapers to come through our front door? No.” There was a bitter edge to his voice, one that Shepard hadn’t heard before. “The Alliance –” He stopped as soon as he began, perhaps realizing that he was saying too much. He turned back toward the elevator doors. “I’m sorry, Commander. Maybe you should ask the Director about what’s happened since you’ve been gone.”

She watched him carefully but his expression gave nothing away. She turned her eyes forward. “Maybe I will, then.”

The elevator doors opened to an expectant Miranda. She gave them both a cold once over before addressing them. “I’ve just delivered my report to the Director.” She cocked a hip, settling her hard gaze on Shepard. “He’s anxious to speak with you, Shepard.”

“The feeling’s mutual.” Shepard crossed her arms, meeting Miranda’s gaze. “Maybe now I can finally get some real answers.”

Miranda was unfazed. “The Director will answer any remaining questions you might have. The QEC is just through that door. We’ll wait for you here.”

The door opened and Shepard swept her eyes around the room before stepping inside. The darkened room beyond was bare walls and floor, remarkable only for the illuminated pad in the center. She turned on her heel when the door closed behind her with a hushed sound. Her eyes flicked back to the circle of light in the center of the room and she approached it cautiously.

She tested the pad with the toe of her boot and it brightened in reaction. An electric hum filled the room as the light continued to grow, making her turn her face away. A projected grid rose from the floor, enclosing her in a prison of light. The brightened pad under her feet began to fade, leaving only the light of the grid entrapping her.

As she turned around in the circle, the grid began to fill with color. Spots of light spread and merged to form a coherent picture, spilling across boundaries like liquid on glass.

A cityscape stretched before her, glimmering like an expanse of stars under a twilight sky. Towers of metal and glass raked at the darkening sky, flashing with the light of the setting sun. A skeletal tower was surrounded by a circle of cranes, their heads bowed as if asleep. She could see the movement of the streets far below, dancing with light. A mountain ridge carved a swath of darkness through the lights of the city. Beyond the reach of the city’s towers, the ocean pressed against the sky. The horizon was ablaze with the light of dusk, all rich purples and vibrant reds, cut by the jagged lines of the city’s skyline. It was a sunset that was familiar to her. She reached out a hand and the image shimmered beneath her touch like a fever dream.

“Commander Shepard,” a man’s voice said in greeting. “It’s good to see you.”

She turned from the cityscape to find herself in a darkened office. The light from the window filtered in behind her, bathing the room in orange light and casting long, arching shadows over the floor. The lean figure of a man moved through the shadows to stand just beyond the reach of the light. In the darkness, Shepard could see the spark of a cigarette being lit. The wavering light made the man’s face looked harsh and lined. His eyes were blue and bright, unnaturally so.

“I understand that you were born here, Shepard.” He took a long drag from his cigarette and let the next sentence drift out on a plume of smoke. “How does it feel to return home?”

“I haven’t been home in almost ten years,” she answered, and her dark eyes drifted back to the city below. “I didn’t know Homeland kept offices in Honolulu.”

“We don’t,” the man admitted. He moved into the light of the sunset to stand beside her. He was well dressed in an Earth-fashion suit, rather than the ubiquitous asari style. His hair was dark, framed by a dignified grey at the temples. As he took another drag from his cigarette, the man looked contemplative. “But I have never known a more beautiful sunset.” He turned his blue eyes toward Shepard. “It’s something worth coming back to, wouldn’t you agree?”

She didn’t answer. The sun sank below the city’s skyline and they were both left in darkness.

The cityscape dissolved before them, leaving the window empty. A single spot of light appeared in the center of the blackened surface and grew gradually to fill her vision. The molten surface of a star raged before her, an unstable mass of red and orange flame. It cast an eerie light through the polarized glass, reflected off the gleaming tile and filling the room with shifting shadows. The sight of it chilled her to her core, but she kept her face impassive as the man addressed her.

“My name is Jack Harper. I am the Alliance’s Director of Military Intelligence and Homeland Security. I’m sure you have questions for me.”

“I do.” She straightened reflexively, crossing her arms behind her back as she spoke. Her respectful attention almost softened the bluntness of her words. “I hear I cost you a fortune. Why’d you do it?”

The Director’s cigarette flared and through the smoke his eyes were watchful. “Because you may very well be the only thing standing between humanity and the greatest threat of our brief existence.”

He turned from the window and Shepard tracked him as he moved toward a chair in the center of the room. “You could have raised an army with what you spent on me. I’m just a soldier.”

“You’re valuable, Shepard.” He brushed his hand over the arm of the chair to bring up a haptic interface. Half a dozen screens flashed alight, streams of information flowing across their surface. The man dismissed them all with a small movement of his hand and sat down to regard her coolly. “Not only as a soldier, but as a resource. You activated the beacon on Eden Prime, you have the Cipher. You spoke with Sovereign on Virmire and with the Prothean VI on Ilos. Your knowledge may make all the difference in this war.”

Knowledge was a generous word for it. The impressions from the beacon were seared into her memory, a cacophony of the pain and horror of billions of dead souls. Armies clashed with legions of their own dead. Millennia old cities crumbled before the onslaught. Whole worlds burned as orbital bombardment set their atmospheres alight. Liara told Shepard that the memories would linger, but neither of them could have imagined that they would last from one lifetime into the next.

“I don’t think you brought me back just to pick my brain about Reapers.” Shepard searched the man’s face for any kind of clue, any kind of tell, but found nothing. “You could’ve asked Liara T’soni. She was right there with me from the very beginning. She knows everything I know.”

“Even if she did have access to everything you know, Dr. T’soni cannot be trusted. She’s been working as an information broker on Illium and may have ties to the Shadow Broker. If so, the Alliance cannot risk that sort of breach of information.”

Shepard scoffed. “That’s a little naïve, isn’t it? You don’t think the Shadow Broker hasn’t already infiltrated the Alliance?”

“Who do you think was behind the attack that so nearly cost you your life?” Maybe it was the light of the star passing over his face, but the man’s eyes seemed to flash in the darkness. “I can assure you that the Shadow Broker won’t find another foothold in our operation.”

“And that makes me feel so much better.”

He took another long drag from his cigarette, choosing his words carefully. “You are right, though. There is more to this than your knowledge of the Reapers.” His eyes found hers and Shepard could swear that he could see straight through her. “Your return will mean a great deal to humanity. The sole survivor of the siege on Akuze. The first human Spectre. The Savior of the Citadel. You are a symbol of what humanity can accomplish.”

Shepard said nothing, the silence heavy with the weight of the man’s words. Shepard was just some Earthborn dirtbag. She was no savior, no hero. There was no misguided sense of honor behind her actions. She joined the Alliance out of necessity – to start a new life. _God must have a sick sense of humor_ , she thought, _to have taken that so literally._

Of all the questions that roiled through her troubled mind, “why now?” was the one she managed to ask.

“We’re at war.” The Director ground out his cigarette. “The Council won’t admit it, but humanity is under attack. Entire colonies have been disappearing.” With a flick of his hand, a screen appeared. Images of empty colonies flashed across the surface – prefabs uninhabited, dinners half eaten, beds left unmade. “Human colonies.”

“And you believe the Reapers are involved,” Shepard finished.

“We believe it is someone working for the Reapers. Just as Saren and the geth aided Sovereign.”

Saren was more machine than man when she faced him in the Council chambers, a horrifying revenant of flesh and tech. Even with the battle raging all around them, the shot that took his life rang out unnaturally loud, reverberating through the empty chamber. She remembered the way his impressive frame crumpled, lifeless. And she remembered the way his corpse rent itself open, muscles shearing and bones snapping as Sovereign assumed control of his shattered body.

Shepard wondered what Saren thought, when he put that gun to his head. Did his life flash before his eyes? Did he see the man he used to be – the man that war had made and remade? When he pulled the trigger, was he thinking of the galaxy he thought he’d save? Was he thinking of the oath he made, before the Reapers stole his mind? Did that bullet finally drive their voices from his head?

Thank you, he said.

“The Alliance needs you, Shepard.” The Director was watching her, his face inscrutable. “Humanity needs you.”

Shepard flexed her ruined hand then clenched it into a tight fist. “Do I have a choice?”

He smiled at her, his blue eyes bright in the light of the raging sun. “You always have a choice, Shepard.”

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> timshel (East of Eden, John Steinbeck)


	5. empty spaces between stars

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Human colonies are disappearing. Shepard is sent to investigate a recent disappearance, and finds an empty colony filled with hollow prefabs. And in the ruins, meets a familiar face.
> 
> No content warnings apply.

The call came four weeks later.

Shepard was in the mess, flattening a slab of gelatin with the back of her spoon. Her skin was flushed and slick with sweat. She had spent the better part of her morning beating the living shit out of the gym’s heavy bag, taking an unseemly amount of pleasure in the give of plastic beneath her fists. It was the only thing that passed for fun these days.

Shepard hoped that security would slacken a little after her meeting with the Director, but her hope was misplaced. Extranet signals were still blocked and she burned through the books Jacob gave her weeks ago. Nobody so much as looked at her, let alone spoke to her. She could see the fear of court martial in every wayward glance.

It was a lonely existence.

During the day, she could lose herself in the ache of her muscles and the pounding of her heart. At night, the exhaustion could still her restless thoughts. It was meal times that were the hardest. In the conspicuous quiet of the mess, Shepard couldn’t escape her loneliness. Everyone spoke in low inaudible tones around her, never rising above a murmur. It was a far cry from the raucous conversation that would fill the _Normandy_ ’s small crew deck. It made Shepard remember the way that Garrus would laugh, unrestrained, at his own jokes – and the way that Ashley would purse her lips, trying to keep a straight face. It made her remember Wrex’s amused rumble, Liara’s reserved smile, Tali’s bubbling giggle, Kaidan’s wide grin.

_God, I miss them._

Shepard found it hard to believe that her crew grew so close so quickly. It was hard to escape the tension during those first few weeks aboard the _Normandy._ They were all so different – they came from different worlds, in every sense of the word. Looking back, she was surprised there weren’t more arguments (most of them involved Ashley or Garrus. Or, God help her, Ashley _and_ Garrus).

Shepard’s thoughts were interrupted by the sudden silence that fell over the room. She looked up from her plate to see Jacob standing in the doorway. From the stern furrow in his brows, Shepard knew that the time had finally come.

The brief was quick, given as the two of them stalked toward the armory. Freedom’s Progress was a small colony, with only 100,000 colonists situated around an urban center. The city only had a small garrison of soldiers and a modest compliment of security mechs to defend it. The comm buoy went down at least two hours ago and it would take another six to reach the colony. It was unlikely that they’d be able to stop the attack, but it was possible that they’d be able to identify the attackers.

In the armory, Shepard stripped to her underwear and shoved her sweaty clothes into her locker. She pulled her skinsuit up over her scarred torso and slid her arms into the sleeves, her skin prickling as the conductive gel settled against her skin. She strode to the wall mounted drawers containing her armor and with a brisk kick bid it to open with a wheeze. The pieces of her armor caught the fluorescent light of the armory, shining like polished onyx. There were no scuffs on the knees, dents in the chest piece, or scratches in the paint. The sight of her pauldron, painted in the N7 colors, made her pause. She lifted the piece out of the drawer and held it up to the light.

“I kept my rank.”

Jacob looked over at her as he shrugged into his skinsuit. “Yeah. Didn’t seem right to take it from you.” He grinned. “Why? You think you need to go back and refresh your memory?”

“That a dig at me, Mr. Taylor?”

Jacob laughed. “No. I’ve seen what you do to that heavy bag and I’m not about to be next.”

That odd sense of familiarity – the way he talked to her, joked with her, even tried to comfort her – had never really gone away. But after nearly two months together, it didn’t seem so out of place. Jacob always seemed to be nearby, a fact that Shepard resented during her first unsteady expeditions out of bed. “You sure you don’t have something better to do?” she snapped, after the fourth or fifth time he picked her up from the floor. He didn’t say anything then, merely held out his hand, again, for her to take. But even after Shepard was able to swat his hand away and stand on her own he was never far from her. As resistant as she was, Jacob became a steadying presence in the chaos of her second life, for which Shepard was grateful.

Not that she would ever admit it.

Shepard dressed with efficiency, more than she would have expected based on her time out of practice. She strapped each piece of armor tightly to her body, checking its connection to her skinsuit as she went. She slid on her helmet and checked the environmental seals with her fingers. Her hardsuit’s computer booted quickly and her HUD flashed to life. For what felt like the first time in months, Shepard almost felt like her old self again.

Jacob suited up as well, and when Shepard turned to him he held out a pistol for her to take. Through his visor, Shepard could see that he was smiling.

“You look good.”

“Yeah? You clean up pretty good too, Mr. Taylor.”

Shepard took the pistol from him and turned it over in her hand. The feel was off – unbalanced by the oversized heat sink, probably. Shepard made a mental note to fix that and holstered it to her hip.

“Oh, and I almost forgot –” Jacob tossed a ring through the air and Shepard caught it in her hand. The ring was smooth and flexible, large enough to fit over her hand. “– you’ll need that on Freedom’s Progress.”

“Finally giving me an omnitool?” Shepard pulled off her glove to slip the omnitool over her wrist. She flexed her fingers to light up the interface. “You gonna keep tabs on me? Track my movements, tap my calls?” She looked up, suddenly serious. “You’re not gonna check my search history, are you?”

“I’d advise against doing anything to compromise the integrity of our mission, Shepard.”

Jacob and Shepard both turned toward the door where Miranda stood waiting. She was dressed in light armor with an SMG and a pistol holstered on either hip.

Shepard brought the interface up to her mouth. “This is Commander Shepard. Come to Freedom’s Progress in the next twelve hours for an ass kicking.”

Miranda wasn’t amused. “The Alliance has a vested interest in keeping your return a secret, Shepard. This is no laughing matter.”

“Relax.” Shepard dismissed the interface with an irritated flex of her fingers. “I’m not about to broadcast our location to the extranet. I’m not a complete idiot.”

“The time will come when this level of security is no longer necessary. For now, while your killers are still unknown, you need to exercise caution.”

While Jacob became a familiar presence, Miranda maintained an air of clinical detachment. They spent a considerable amount of time together in the early weeks of Shepard’s rehabilitation. Miranda would watch from across the room as Shepard would struggle to stand, walk, and then later run. She would speak in low tones with her colleagues from the Lazarus Project, her blue eyes occasionally drifting back toward her subject.  If she spoke to her, it was to ask how she was feeling. “Like shit,” Shepard would reply. Once Miranda told Shepard that she was impressed with her progress, but that seemed more like a self-satisfied observation than a compliment.

Shepard moved past Jacob to the weapon rack, where she selected an M-22.

“I assume you’re here for a reason?”

“I’ll be accompanying you to Freedom’s Progress.”

“What, as my babysitter?”

A flicker of annoyance passed over Miranda’s face. “Worried about my qualifications? I can crush a mech with my biotics or shoot its head off at a hundred yards. Take your pick.”

Shepard moved toward Miranda and their eyes locked. “I don’t need you questioning my orders,” Shepard said, her register on the verge of threatening.

Jacob interrupted. “The Alliance didn’t bring you back just to have us second guessing your decisions, Shepard. We’re just here to make sure the mission succeeds. Right, Miranda?”

Miranda’s gaze didn’t waver, light blue to Shepard’s dark brown. “Agreed.”

…

Shepard was accustomed to the tumult of battle. It came from years spent on the front lines, the thunder of artillery behind her; it came from her time in basic training, surrounded by the chatter of gunfire; it even came from the personal wars waged in her old life on Earth, through shouts and curses and blows landing. All of it prepared her for the cacophony of a battlefield. What she never got used to was the anticipatory silence, waiting for the first shot to be fired. In some ways, the moments of quiet apprehension were worse than the rush of battle.

Needless to say, the silence of Freedom’s Progress was unnerving.

The stars shone like tiny pinpricks in the fabric of the absolute darkness. The planet’s twin moons hung like ornaments in the sky. A gentle snowfall dusted Shepard’s shoulders with tiny flakes, and the falling crystals caught the light of her flashlight, pale dots floating in the beam.

Shepard’s team and the platoon of marines accompanying them were dropped in the city’s center, following a fruitless sweep from the air. No movement, no EM signatures, no heartbeats. The city’s center was a broad square with avenues branching off to the east and west. A larger thoroughfare led to the north and south, and from the sky Shepard saw they were framed by neat rows of prefabricated buildings.

“Hunter two-one, I want you on the southern end. Hunters two-two and two-three, I want you on the eastern and western paths. I’m on the north.” Shepard swept her gaze over the marines, each of them at attention. “Sweep the buildings and search for survivors. Stay sharp and keep in radio contact, I don’t want my ass to get jumped. Rendezvous here in two hours.”

“Acknowledged, Commander,” the platoon leader responded, her voice tinny over the comm.

Shepard turned toward the northern avenue, leveling her weapon. Jacob and Miranda followed close behind, leaving three sets of footprints in the snow.

The door of the first building she tried was unlocked and the door slid open with a soft hiss. The interior was dark, the light from her flashlight cast long shadows over the floor of the small prefab. The table in the kitchen was half set for breakfast and a chair was pulled out for someone. The bed in the small bedroom was unmade, a dress spread out over the end.

“I don’t like this,” Jacob said quietly.

Shepard didn’t reply, merely gestured toward the door. Miranda and Jacob filed out and Shepard followed close behind.

The next dozen prefabs were more of the same. No signs of struggle, no signs of forced entry. It was as if every colonist had simply vanished, leaving their mornings half finished.

It didn’t make sense.

“Shepard,” Jacob’s voice came over the comm. Shepard turned toward him and found him staring into a long shadowed alley between two prefabs. A set of footprints led out of the alley, stopping at the wide street before turning around doubling back.

Shepard beckoned them forward.

Shepard crept around the corner, her weapon raised. Her flashlight swept over the alley, then illuminated the skeletal figure of a security mech.

A voice exploded over her comm. “The mechs are live! The mechs are live and hostile, do not –” The chatter of gunfire interrupted the transmission and she could hear shouting over the line.

The mech turned slowly on its heel and stopped at the sight of her. It raised its weapon halfway before crumpling backwards from the shot to its head.

Shepard glanced over her shoulder. Miranda was behind her, lowering her pistol. “Someone must have activated those mechs,” she said quietly.

_Turns out she wasn’t lying about her aim._

The sound of gunfire echoed from across the city before dying suddenly. Shepard opened the comm. “Hunter 2 actual, what’s the situation?”

The platoon leader’s voice crackled over the comm. “Two wounded in two-three. One in two-two. They got the jump on us, won’t happen again.”

“Intel puts the security station at the northern end of the colony,” Jacob said.

Shepard reopened the comm. “Stay sharp, there’s bound to be more of them. I’ll see about shutting down those mechs.”

“Acknowledged.”

Shepard, Jacob, and Miranda made their way through the winding streets toward the flag marked on her compass. The heavy silence was broken periodically by the sound of distant gunfire. Shepard held up a closed fist when a blip appeared on her radar. The movement came from a prefab straight ahead, not far from the security station. In the snow, Shepard could see half a dozen footprints all leading to the building, pressed together in wedge formation.

Shepard signaled an approach. Jacob took position to the side of the door, his fist hovering over the release. Miranda stood behind Shepard, her pistol raised. Shepard leveled her shotgun and took a steadying breath before nodding to Jacob.

The door slid open to a group of quarians hunched over a console – scavengers, probably.

“On the ground!” Shepard shouted, “I said on _the fucking ground!”_

The standing quarians drew their weapons, unwilling to stand down.

“Prazza _wait_ –” a clear voice called. A quarian woman stepped in between the two groups, slapping a shotgun out of her way. “—you said you’d let me handle this!” She turned toward Shepard, her amethyst face plate catching the light as she turned.

Shepard’s gun lowered.

“Tali?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Desert Places, Robert Frost


	6. all great and precious things

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> With the help of an old friend, Shepard finds the evidence she needs to prove that the colony disappearances are targeted attacks. But answering one question just raises more questions.
> 
> Content warning for canon typical violence.

Tali stared. “… Shepard? Is that really you?”

“Tali, I… I know I’m late on those extranet bursts, but I wanna know.” Shepard smiled weakly. “Your pilgrimage – did the geth data help?”

“… Yes. It did.” She turned toward the leader of the quarian marines. “Prazza, weapons down.”

Shepard holstered her weapon. Jacob and Miranda did the same, Miranda more begrudgingly than Jacob. Slowly, the quarians lowered their weapons too.

“It really is you,” Tali said quietly. Shepard paused, and then took a step forward.

“Tali –” Shepard began.

Tali closed the gap between them, throwing her arms around Shepard’s shoulders. Shepard’s arms came up around Tali’s back and pulled her into a tight embrace. Something surged upward through her chest, and Shepard couldn’t help the laugh that burst out of her.

“I thought you were dead,” Tali said into Shepard’s shoulder.

“I was.”

“There was a funeral.”

“I’m sorry I missed it.”

Tali’s bright eyes found Shepard’s as she slid out of the embrace.

“I missed you,” Tali said.

Shepard thought of the long months spent in isolation. She thought of the empty _Normandy_ , and the vast emptiness of space. “God, I missed you too,” Shepard replied.

Tali’s eyes narrowed in what Shepard learned to interpret as affection.

“Not that this isn’t touching…” Miranda began, putting an end to that shared moment. Shepard had to stifle her annoyance.

“Tali, what are you even doing here?” Shepard asked.

“I could ask the same of you.”

“I’m here to investigate why human colonies in the Terminus are disappearing,” Shepard explained.

“No. I mean why – _how_ – did you come back?”

“Oh. The Alliance brought me back. It’s a long story.” Shepard glanced over her shoulder at Miranda, who didn’t look pleased about the privileged information being shared. Shepard grinned at Tali. “Must owe some back taxes or something.”

Tali laughed, probably harder than was warranted by the joke. Shepard felt that swell of affection rise in her chest again. She didn’t realize how much she missed making Tali laugh.

“Okay, now you share,” Shepard prodded.

“We’re here looking for a young quarian on his pilgrimage, Veetor,” Tali explained.

“In a human colony that’s just been attacked?” Miranda asked, skeptical.

“Call it an extradition,” the quarian marine – Prazza – bit back.

Shepard’s gaze went back and forth between Prazza and Miranda. “I’m sorry, is there a problem here?”

“A lot has changed since you’ve been gone, Shepard,” Tali said. “The Alliance –” she began.

“The Alliance infiltrated the Flotilla, sabotaged our ship, and killed our people,” Prazza finished, his eyes never leaving Miranda. “All for one man.”

“The Alliance has disavowed the actions of Paul Grayson,” Miranda replied. “He is a fugitive and a traitor to the Alliance.”

“Regardless,” Jacob interrupted, stepping between them. “We both have a job to do.”

“Agreed,” Tali nodded.

While pilgrimages to small human colonies such as Freedom’s Progress were uncommon, it suited Veetor. Tali called him “nervous.” Prazza called him “unstable.” The quarians saw Veetor flee into the security station as they were landing. The mechs attacked them on sight, leading Tali to believe that Veetor reprogrammed the mechs to attack anything that moved. If Veetor was wounded, it was likely that he was not in his right mind when he did so.

There were too many mechs for one small team to take down on their own. Working together, Tali’s team and Shepard’s could split the mech’s fire and approach from either side of the security station. There, they could shut down the mechs and find Veetor. If Veetor was in the colony before the attack, it was likely he could answer some of Shepard’s questions.

“Now we’re working for the Alliance?” Prazza protested.

“No, Prazza. You’re working for me,” Tali said, coldly.

Before the quarians left, Tali laid a hand on Shepard’s arm. “Whatever happens…” she said, “it’s good to have you back.”

Shepard smiled. “It’s good to be back,” she said, and meant it.

The quarian marines filed out through the back entrance of the prefab. Tali’s bright gaze lingered on Shepard’s face before she turned to follow the marines out.

Shepard and her team resumed their serpentine path toward the security station to avoid the main thoroughfare. Eventually the streets funneled into what appeared to be a sunken cargo dock, filled with containers of materials and cranes and other heavy machinery to move them. Seven blips appeared on Shepard’s radar, moving in a perfectly synchronized and predictable pattern along the perimeter of the docks. “Mech patrol,” she said over the comm.

They paused just beyond the edge of the floodlights illuminating the cargo dock. Ahead Shepard could see four humanoid LOKI mechs sweeping the area from their sentry posts on a raised platform – presumably the foreman’s office. Below, three quadruped FENRIS mechs patrolled along the ground.

Shepard made a quick appraisal of the situation. Jacob was a strong biotic and a good shot, making him ideal for the LOKI mechs at range; Miranda was suited to keeping the FENRIS mechs at bay with her powerful biotics; and Shepard... well. Shepard was good at hitting things at range and even better when they got too close.

“Jacob, you go high, Miranda and I will go low,” Shepard ordered.

Jacob nodded. “Acknowledged, Commander.”

“Go.”

Jacob leaned out of cover to fire at the closest LOKI mech, packing a tight cluster of bullets into its chest before it toppled to the ground. The other LOKI mechs reeled on him, and the three FENRIS mechs started their charge. Miranda’s biotic glow flared alight in the darkness as she stepped forward, and with a gesture that looked effortless she lifted two of the FENRIS mechs off the ground, their limbs still running through the air.

While Miranda’s biotic glow was controlled and precise, Shepard’s was blazing and wild. Feeling the energy of the eezo coursing through her body, Shepard sent a surge of biotic energy through a forceful gesture toward the floating mechs, sending them flying backward into the concrete walls with a satisfying _crack_. The last mech on the ground accelerated, faster than Shepard anticipated, and it leaped at her with its full weight, knocking her prone.

The taser device between the mech’s two red eyes sparked alight, crackling and snapping. The mech lunged at her and Shepard just managed to wedge her forearm under the mech’s neck, holding it at bay. It lunged repeatedly like a hound, leveraging itself on its legs to push itself against her. Shepard felt the sizzling of eezo down her arm as she clenched her fist and punched it through the belly of the mech. She reached inside and her hand closed around what felt like something important. With a grunt Shepard ripped it out, and the mech whined as it powered down.

Shepard pushed the mech off her and scrambled to her feet, taking in the state of the battlefield.

Jacob had his rifle leveled at another LOKI mech, with two already fallen in a heap and the last drifting helplessly off the platform, caught in his mass effect field. The ruins of the FENRIS mechs were scattered across the ground and Miranda was trading fire with the LOKI mechs. She leaned out of cover and with a flash of blue light Miranda slammed the floating mech to the ground, shattering it into pieces. Miranda was turning to look at her when an unseen fourth FENRIS mech came bounding at Miranda from her flank.

Shepard surged forward, propelled by her biotics. She caught just a glimpse of Miranda’s surprised expression before she moved past her. Shepard let the momentum carry her into the mech, using her shoulder to knock it to the ground. The mech flailed its limbs wildly on the ground and Shepard stomped on its chest to hold it in place, cracking its chassis. She leveled her shotgun and fired, roughly where she remembered that important piece was. The mech shuddered and then went still beneath her boot.

The last gunshots reverberated in the empty quarry and then silence fell over Freedom’s Progress again.

Shepard kicked the mech over and turned toward Miranda. “You alright?”

“Yes, Shepard,” Miranda said, the blue light enveloping her fading into the darkness. “Are you hurt?”

“Nah. Just shorted my shields.” Shepard looked over her shoulder at Jacob. “You alive?”

“Still alive,” Jacob responded.

“Good. Looks like we’re almost to the—”

Tali’s voice crackled over her comm. “Shepard! Prazza and the others have rushed ahead. I told them to wait, but the bosh’tets didn’t listen. They want to take Veetor before the Alliance can question him.”

Out of the corner of her eye Shepard saw that flicker of annoyance pass through Miranda’s even expression.

“But Veetor has reprogrammed a heavy mech and now they’ve gotten themselves pinned down in the docks. It’s tearing Prazza’s squad apart!”

“They did want to get to Veetor first,” Miranda said under her breath. Shepard shot her a dangerous look.

“We’re on our way, Tali,” Shepard answered. “I’ll radio you once we’re in position.”

Shepard and her team hustled into the cargo docks. The sounds of fighting grew louder and louder the further in they went. Eventually they came upon an empty square, ringed by shipping containers and slabs of concrete. Directly across from them were the heavy cargo dock doors, from which Shepard could hear gunfire and screams.

“Get into flanking position. I’ll draw its fire,” Shepard ordered, and Miranda and Jacob moved into cover behind concrete barriers and shipping crates on either side of the doors. Shepard crouched behind a concrete barrier and readied her rifle. “Tali,” she radioed, “we’re in position.”

“I’m opening the doors,” Tali responded. “Be careful, Shepard.”

The cargo doors rumbled open and the sounds of fighting became loud and clear. It was a scene of chaos. Half of the quarian marines were firing from the little cover inside they could find while the other half lay bleeding on the floor. In the middle of the chaos was a massive mech, easily three meters tall, heavily armored and heavily armed. It whirled around and fixed its red-eyed gaze on Shepard.

Shepard managed to hit the mech between its eyes and see its shields shimmer before the thing’s left arm opened into a rocket launcher. Shepard’s eyes went wide. She dropped behind cover as the rocket collided with the barrier and exploded, sending shockwaves through her chest and making her ears ring.

“It has a fucking _rocket launcher?”_ Shepard yelled. “What kind of psychopathic fucking colonist needs a fucking –” Another rocket struck the concrete barrier, cutting her off.

“I’ll try to short its shields!” Tali shouted, but her voice was quickly drowned out as the mech swapped to its mass accelerator cannon and began its forward assault on Shepard’s position.

Tali popped up from behind the concrete barrier she was hiding behind and tapped rapidly on her omnitool. Suddenly the mech’s shields sparked and died, leaving its armor exposed. In the lull in gunfire as the mech switched weapons Shepard straightened behind the barrier. She unloaded a magazine on the mech, pelting the mech’s armor with absolutely nothing to show for it. Jacob and Miranda leaned out of cover to fire at the mech, but their shots weren’t penetrating either.

 _We’ll get nowhere just needling it to death_. _There has to be something else._

Shepard looked around the cargo docks. There was a crane holding up what looked to be generator, large enough to power a block of prefabs. Large enough to wreck a mech.

Shepard dashed out of the cover of the concrete barrier and toward the far side of the cargo dock. She heard Miranda shout at her, but her voice was lost in the roar of the mech’s guns. The bullets tracked her as she sprinted for cover, exploding containers and pitting the walls. When the roaring stopped, Shepard had just enough time to turn and look at the rocket streaming toward her.

A biotic charge pushed her past the worst of the blast, but it still threw her forward, landing on the ground hard enough to knock the wind out of her. Shepard was stunned for a moment before she managed to turn over onto her back. The crane was just above her. She knew, despite her augmentations, that she didn’t have the biotic strength to throw the generator herself. But gravity could do the rest.

Shepard heard the mech’s mass accelerator cannon spinning up behind her. She reached out a hand, her outstretched arm glowing with blue energy. The crane creaked on its hinges when she made a fist and then groaned when she pulled.

Shepard pulled with all the might she could muster, making the blue light around her flare like a flame. The crane dipped forward under the increased weight of its load, the metal armature straining before bending and toppling over.

The generator crushed the mech, its chassis crumpling under its weight. Both the mech and the generator hit the ground with a _boom_ , shaking the floor of the cargo dock. The red lights of its eyes flickered and then died.

Shepard let her arm slump to her side and she lay there panting from the exertion.

“Shepard!” She heard the sound of multiple footsteps running toward her. “Shepard!”

Tali was the first to appear in her view, her bright eyes wide with concern. “Shepard, are you okay?”

“Y’know,” Shepard said from the ground, “I’ve been worse.”

Tali laughed, and it made Shepard smile. “Somehow I knew you would say that.”

Jacob was next to appear, still holstering his weapon. “Shepard, are you alright?”

“Yeah, I’m alright.”

“That was a helluva thing you just did,” Jacob sounded impressed.

“Gravity is a helluva thing, Mr. Taylor.”

Jacob held out his hand for her to take. She took it and he pulled her to her feet, just as he had nearly every day for the past eight weeks.

When Shepard got up, Miranda was standing right in front of her. There was cold fury in her eyes, and it was the first time Shepard saw her without her icy composure.

“What was that?” she snapped.

“Some might call it heroics,” Shepard replied.

“You could have died, Shepard.”

“That can happen when you’re fighting a giant fucking mech with rocket launchers for hands.”

“It was an unnecessary risk.”

“The Alliance doesn’t pay me to sit around and look pretty,” Shepard said, bristling.

“The Alliance paid for your return,” Miranda countered.

“Look, do you want my help or not?”

“… the Alliance needs you,” Miranda conceded.

“Then shut up and fall in line.”

Miranda looked like she was about to object when they were interrupted by a groan coming from inside the cargo bay. Tali bolted for the cargo bay to kneel beside one of the quarian marines. She began administering first aid, prioritizing sealing suit ruptures and staunching the bleeding with medigel. Shepard moved to join her but Jacob put a hand on her shoulder. “We need to shut down those mechs,” he said, “before they overrun our position.”

It took a considerable amount of will, but the distant sound of gunfire across the colony made Shepard shift her gaze from Tali and the quarians toward the security station just beyond the docks. It was a quick climb, and while Veetor was a talented technician the lock of a shitty prefab was no match for a shotgun shell. The door opened, spilling moonlight onto a seated figure in front of a wall of haptic monitors.

The young quarian was tapping at the interface, seemingly unaware of their presence. He shifted from monitor to monitor, each one displaying a different vantage point of the colony. Most of them were of open prefabs and empty streets, but a few of them showed Shepard’s marines moving swiftly from cover to cover. One showed the marines holding down a position against a dozen mechs. Shepard grimaced and moved toward Veetor.

Veetor mumbled to himself as he manipulated the video feeds and typed commands into the security system. His faceplate reflected the images on the screen and Shepard could watch her marines run across his face in miniature. Even from afar Shepard could see that Veetor’s eyes were wide with terror.

“Monsters coming back. Mechs will protect. Safe from swarms. Have to hide. No monsters. No swarms. No-no-no-no-no,” Veetor said to himself.

“Veetor,” Shepard called.

“No Veetor,” the quarian responded. “Not here. Swarms can’t find. Have to hide.”

“It’s safe now, Veetor. Nobody’s gonna hurt you now.”

It took some coaxing, but Shepard eventually got some details out of Veetor. “Swarms” descended on the colony, closely followed by “monsters.” They took all the humans of the colony away to their ship, leaving Veetor behind. Veetor’s suit probably didn’t show on whatever sensor the attackers were using. Or, as Miranda pointed out, the attackers were just looking for humans. At first blush, it sounded like a mass kidnapping by slavers, pirates, or mercs, aided by probes armed with a stasis field or a neurotoxin.

“You don’t know,” the quarian responded to that. “You didn’t see. But I see everything.” Veetor pressed a key on the console and a video began to play.

The footage was grainy, obviously pieced together from dozens of security cameras throughout the city. In the video, Shepard could see tall, long limbed, insectoid figures walking down the streets, escorting what looked like floating cart. She sucked in a breath through her teeth at the sight of the humans piled inside. She watched as a pair of the figures entered the frame, carrying a limp body between them. The figures carelessly tossed the figure onto the cart and then guided the cart out of frame. The video stopped, lingering on the frame of a single insectoid figure following after the others.

“What the hell is that?” Jacob asked.

“My God…” Miranda said softly. “I think it’s a Collector.”

“A Collector?” Shepard scoffed. “Didn’t think you were one for ghost stories.”

Shepard had heard stories about the Collectors. Mostly from the colony kids from the outer territories, the ones who lived on the frontiers of human space. The stories said that the Collectors were an alien race from beyond the Omega-4 relay, where no ship ever returned. They appeared in the Terminus occasionally, trading advanced alien tech. But they didn’t trade for supplies or materials. They traded for people. Their requests were oddly specific – eight double jointed turians, twelve identical asari twins, fourteen left-handed salarians. Nobody knew what happened to the people once they crossed the Omega-4 relay. Some said they became slaves. Some said that the Collectors performed gruesome experiments on them. Some said the Collectors just ate them like rare delicacies. The stories always differed in the little details, but the core of the story remained the same: when the Collectors couldn’t trade for the people they wanted, they stole them from the outer worlds.

Shepard had always dismissed the Collectors as a myth among colonists. It was easy to believe in monsters when you lived on the edge of the infinite darkness between galaxies.

“I can assure you, Commander, that the Collectors are very real,” said Miranda. “We’ve received reports of increased Collector activity in the Terminus,” she continued, “but it seemed innocuous at the time. There never seemed to be a pattern in the Collector’s dealings. Not until now.” Miranda fixed her scrutinizing gaze on the Collector on the screen again. “I didn’t even think they were capable of organizing this way.”

“What did the monsters do with the colonists, Veetor?” Shepard asked.

“The monsters took the people onto their ship, and then they left.” The fear returned to Veetor’s eyes. “The ship flew away. But they’ll be back for me.” Veetor was bordering on hysteria. “No one escapes!”

Shepard recognized that kind of fear. She had seen it in the soldiers under her command, after their first brush with death. She felt it herself, all those years ago on Akuze.

“They’re gone now, Veetor. We’re gonna get you someplace safe,” Shepard promised.

“We’ll find out where they went and bring all those people back,” Jacob added, “we just need your help to do it.”

That seemed to pacify Veetor, at least a little. He opened his omnitool and Shepard could see streams of data scrolling across the screen. “I studied them. The monsters. The swarms,” Veetor said. “I recorded them with my omnitool.”

“That’s exactly what we need, Veetor,” Shepard said. “Thank you.”

Miranda turned to Shepard and Jacob. “We need to get this data to the Director,” she said, back to her cold and efficient manner. “Grab the quarian and call for the shuttle.” The order irritated Shepard.

“What did I tell you about falling –” Shepard began.

She was cut off by the door opening behind them. Tali was standing in the doorway, framed by the moonlight outside.

“What do you mean ‘grab the quarian?’ Veetor is sick and needs treatment, not an interrogation!” Tali protested.

“We won’t hurt him,” Jacob reassured her. “We just need to see if he knows anything else. He’ll be returned unharmed.”

“You’ve already betrayed us once already,” Miranda said, coolly. “If we give him to you, we may never get the intel we need.”

“Prazza was an idiot, and he and his men paid for it,” Tali said, bitterly. She turned to Shepard. “You can take Veetor’s omnitool, but please just let me take him,” she entreated.

Miranda looked at Shepard expectantly. “He’s in shock, Miranda. He’s in no condition to answer any questions. Veetor goes with Tali.”

Miranda pursed her lips into a hard line. “Understood, Commander.”

The crackle of static on Shepard’s comm interrupted the conversation. “Commander,” the platoon leader said over the line, “the mechs have shut down. We’ll clean up and keep sweeping the city for survivors.”

“Belay that, hunter 2 actual. Return to the rendezvous point and wait for extraction. I don’t think we’re gonna find anything else in this colony.”

“Acknowledged, Commander.”

When Shepard returned to the conversation Tali was watching her. “I’m glad to see that you’re still the one giving the orders, Shepard.”

“It’s what they pay me for. Speaking of,” Shepard smiled at Tali, “you looking for a job?”

Tali shook her head. “I would, but I’ve already got a job to do. It’s too important to abandon, even for you.”

“What could be more important than kicking ass and taking names across the galaxy?” Shepard teased. “It’ll be just like old times.”

“I don’t think the Alliance needs to hear about it,” Tali’s eyes wandered to Jacob and Miranda before returning to Shepard. “But it’s in geth space. That should tell you how important it is.”

Tali’s serious expression made Shepard’s smile falter. Shepard realized that she was doomed to return to that lonely space station without her.

“Tali –” Shepard began.

“The Flotilla needs me, Shepard.”

“But what if _I_ need you?” she blurted out. Shepard was surprised by her outburst. She knew Tali. She knew that her friends, her family, her Flotilla were the most important things in Tali’s life. It was wrong of her to ask Tali to abandon them for her. But Shepard couldn’t help but want her to anyway.

Tali narrowed her eyes again, this time more sadly. “When it’s over, if I’m still alive,” Tali reached out to take Shepard’s hands. Shepard had forgotten how small Tali’s three-fingered hands were in hers. “I’ll come find you.”

Shepard smiled, weakly. “I’ll hold you to that, Tali’Zorah.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> East of Eden, John Steinbeck


	7. persona incognita

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The mission is simple: stop the Collectors. Accomplishing it is what’s complicated. With new orders from the Director, Shepard prepares for the first step in her mission: building a team.
> 
> No content warnings apply.

Shepard couldn’t sleep.

She lay in her bed, staring up at the ceiling. Her eyes went from rivet to rivet in the crossbeams, searching for any that looked loose. None of them were. Homeland was the type of organization that attracted perfectionists, from leadership down to the maintenance crew.

All around her the station was conspicuously quiet. Over her years of service she had grown used to falling asleep to the sounds of a ship. If anything, the _Normandy_ came to life at night. Shepard remembered Garrus and Wrex loudly exchanging increasingly dangerous and increasingly improbable war stories; she remembered Liara talking to herself under her breath as she poured over her Prothean texts; she remembered the way Tali would blast her music in the engine room; she remembered the good natured arguments Ashley and Kaidan had over meaningless things. Even in the relative quiet of her cabin there were sounds to sleep to: the constant hum of the engine, the murmur of distant conversation, Ashley’s even breathing beside her.

Shepard turned over onto her side to instead examine the bulkhead, the rivets of which she had already memorized. It occurred to her that, had this been the _Normandy_ , had this been her bed, this would be the side that Ashley slept on. Shepard turned over to her other side, staring straight into the darkness of her cabin.

Ashley’s warm presence in her bed was what Shepard missed most. She missed the way Ashley stole her shirts to sleep in, always at least a size too big. She missed when Ashley fell asleep holding her hand. She missed combing her fingers through Ashley’s long hair, brushing it away from her sleepy face. She missed running her hand over Ashley’s side to hold her waist, pulling her close, kissing her until their breathing deepened and they were both wide awake.

With a frustrated noise Shepard kicked off the covers and got out of bed.

Freedom’s Progress was a week ago. In their debriefing the Director urged her to be patient while he completed the necessary preparations for her mission. But Shepard was never known for her patience.

The mission itself was simple: stop the Collectors.

The Director wasn’t surprised when Shepard gave her report about the culprit behind the colony disappearances. Intel revealed that the Collectors had recently made several inquiries to various slavers and merc groups requesting human specimens, particularly those with genetic mutations both rare and mundane.

What wasn’t clear was what the Collectors wanted with their human specimens. Obviously they wanted to take them alive, or why bother with the seeker swarms. Based on the firepower of the ship that attacked the _Normandy_ , Shepard believed that the Collectors could have bombarded any colony from orbit and evaporated it from the face of the planet. It would be far easier to kill the colonists than take them alive.

And why humans?

“Humanity played a key role in the destruction of Sovereign,” said the Director. “I would say that’s enough to draw the Reapers’ attention.”

The mission was simple. Accomplishing it was complicated.

Shepard splashed cold water on her face, letting the faucet run as she shuddered from the cold.

Shepard caught a glimpse of herself in the bathroom mirror as she toweled off. She lowered the towel from her face and examined herself more closely.

Truthfully, she had been avoiding looking at her reflection. The reminders of her death and subsequent revival by the Lazarus Project were all over her body, and Shepard tried her best not to think about it. Though as she looked at herself now, she could see the change that two months made. Her dark hair was growing out, almost to the length it was before. The scars branding her arms and legs and criss-crossing over her torso were fading into her skin, which had recovered its healthy light brown hue. The sharpness of her angular features looked less severe after two months of real food. The rest of her had filled out as well, and Shepard could see the results of her rigorous training in the bulk of her muscles – not quite where she wanted to be, but it was good progress for two months after being woken from the dead.

Some might call it vanity, but Shepard was proud of the body she built. After years of dissatisfaction ranging into despair, she finally felt at peace with the body she lived in. It felt cruel to rob her of that, after everything else the galaxy did to her.

_Galactic hero. What a thankless fucking job_.

The Director informed her that the new Citadel Council was just as obstinate as the previous one. Despite the fact that a whole ass fucking Reaper trashed the Citadel, the Council dug in their heels and denied their existence. Sovereign was a geth warship as far as they were concerned. Commander Shepard’s insistence about the Reaper threat was just misguided paranoia, God rest her soul.

The Alliance’s official position was more of the same. Cannot confirm nor deny the existence of Reapers. Will not comment on Commander Shepard’s claims. Does not support military action in the Terminus Systems. “But you and I both know,” the Director said, “that a persona only obscures the true self.”

Shepard tossed her datapad on the coffee table before sitting down heavily on the couch. She flipped through a few pages of the documents the Director forwarded to her before realizing that she hadn’t actually read a single line. She went back to the beginning and refocused her attention on the words on the screen.

Due to the delicate state of Alliance-Hegemony relations, the Director encouraged Shepard to “act with discretion” in the Terminus Systems. If anyone asked, Shepard was working of her own free will as a highly sought after mercenary. While her Spectre status would allow her to move about the galaxy freely, the Director was pessimistic about the likelihood of Shepard’s reinstatement. But Shepard had a friend in the Council in Anderson. That had to count for something, right?

Spectre or not, if she was going to stop the Collectors she needed a team. One that she could trust to fight and die for her and her cause. When the Director forwarded a list of dossiers for her to review, it was strange to her that her old crew was not included. Shepard asked about Ashley in particular, but the Director told her Ashley’s whereabouts were highly classified. The Corps didn’t want anyone’s eyes on her, including Homeland.

It turns out that two years is a long time, and time waits for no one.

After the second or third unsuccessful pass through the dossiers Shepard irritably tossed the datapad back onto the coffee table. She knew the gist of it. All of the potential recruits were specialists of some kind – tactical, biotic, infiltration, tech. It made for a strong team, but it was hard to find a commonality among them.

_Except that they’re all fucking off the walls crazy._

Shepard didn’t know if the Director expected her to run a ship or a circus given the backgrounds of all the dossiers she read. How was she supposed to put a paragon of asari justice in the same room as a professional murderer? It wasn’t the Director’s problem. She was a “natural leader.” She did it once before, with her old crew in the pursuit of Saren. She supposed that made her the most qualified to be the ringleader of this circus.

Shepard put her head in her hands. She wondered, not for the first time and certainly not the last, how she wound up here. Here, on the edges of Alliance space and millions of light years away from where she started. Shepard joined the Alliance for a chance at a new life. She left her past behind when she signed that contract with her new name, giving away a part of her life to serve the Alliance. At the time it seemed like a small price to pay for a second chance.

But there was always something more. First Akuze, then the _Normandy_. First Saren, now the Collectors. The Alliance kept asking for more, and Shepard wasn’t sure how much more there was left to give.

…

The chime of an incoming message startled Shepard awake.

She was sprawled out on the couch where she finally fell asleep last night. She checked the time with bleary eyes: 0900 – she’d slept late. She opened the notification on her omnitool and then sat upright after reading the message.

_Commander Shepard,_

_Report to the starboard docking bay at 1200 hours. Miranda will brief you. I found you a pilot, one that I think you’ll like. I hear he’s one of the best._

There was no signature, but Shepard knew an order from the Director when she saw one.

Shepard dressed hurriedly to squeeze in a workout before departing. Afterward she showered, changed, and rushed to the mess for a quick meal. The mess felt especially quiet today, and more than once she caught a crewman looking at her with a wayward glance. But Shepard didn’t care. The call had finally come, and Shepard was eager to leave this lonesome post behind.

What little human contact she had before Freedom’s Progress was drastically reduced in the week after. Miranda was too much of a professional to let their argument on the mission affect their relationship, but calling what they had before Freedom’s Progress a “relationship” was a stretch. Regardless, she was notably absent from the examination Shepard was subjected to after their return to the station. Jacob was also scarce. Shepard assumed that they were busy overseeing the preparations for their mission, whatever that entailed.

Shepard reported to the starboard docking bay at exactly 1200 hours. When she arrived, she was alone. Shepard stood at the entrance while she waited, staring out of the reinforced window at the stars of the Terminus system. These stars were unfamiliar to her. Back on Earth, she knew all the constellations in the southern hemisphere. Her father taught them to her. He taught her about the stars, and all the different names for them. He told her that her ancestors used the stars to guide their voyages. Back then, Shepard wondered what it would be like to sail the sea with only the stars to guide her. Never did she think that one day she would voyage amongst them.

“Hey, Commander.”

Shepard turned at the sound of her name. Walking toward her was a man about her age, with a scruffy beard and a grin on his face. He was walking toward her at full speed, despite the braces on his legs and the crutches on his arms.

“…Joker?” Shepard said in disbelief. “Joker, what are you doing here?”

“What am I doing here? What are _you_ doing here? I saw you get spaced,” Joker answered.

“You know me,” Shepard said, a smile spreading across her face. “I’m hard to kill.”

“Doesn’t really count if you get killed and come back, Commander.”

Shepard gestured dismissively. “Details, whatever.”

Joker came to a stop in front of her. Shepard laid a hand, gently, on Joker’s shoulder. She had a solemn expression on her face. “I’m sorry for breaking your arm two years ago,” she said.

“It’s okay. It took a lot of therapy, but I’ve since moved on.” Shepard couldn’t help but laugh, and Joker’s smile widened.

“I’m glad you’re here,” Shepard said. “Because none of these people will talk to me, and I was starting to miss handing out reprimands for smartass comments.”

“And you know how much I love discipline,” he said, giving her a sly smile. Shepard made a face and Joker laughed.

“Well I’m back, which means the fun ends now,” Shepard replied in a stern voice.

In a rare moment of sincerity, Joker smiled at her. “It hasn’t been the same since you’ve been gone.”

Shepard was surprised at first, but then she matched his smile. “Yeah. Likewise.”

“Alright, enough of this emotional crap.” Joker tossed his head in the direction of the docking bay. “C’mon. I need to show you something.”

Shepard followed Joker to the docks, walking at his pace.

“I’ve never known you to keep a secret,” Shepard said with a grin. “You sure you’re cut out for Homeland?”

“I’ve been keeping a secret for two years, Commander,” Joker sounded resentful. “Eden Prime? Classified. Virmire? Classified. Ilos? Extra classified.” Joker gave her a sidelong look. “It all fell apart without you, Commander. Everything we saw, everything you did, the Council just wanted it gone. Team was broken up, records sealed, and I was grounded.” Joker looked forward again, determination on his face. “The Alliance is doing what the Council won’t. Hell yeah I joined Homeland.”

They walked straight through the activity of the docking bays, the crews and pilots parting for their passage. They had that same look of awe and fear in their eyes, something that Shepard had grown used to but was obviously new to Joker. He kept looking from side to side, watching with amusement as the crewmen rushed to get out of their path.

“You trust the Director?” Shepard asked.

“Well, I don’t trust anybody who makes more than I do. But he saved your life. He let me fly again. And then there’s this –”

Joker stopped in front of docking window. Within was a sleek frigate painted in greys and blacks and whites. It was a ship that was familiar to Shepard.

A laugh burst out of her at the absurdity of it all. Not only did the Alliance resurrect and rebuild her, they resurrected and rebuilt her ship too.

“It’ll be just like old times,” Joker said.

“Yeah. Just like old times.” Shepard looked fondly at the ship. Her ship. “I guess she needs a name.”

Joker grinned at her. “Got any inspired ideas, Commander?”

“Y’know, Joker,” she said, “I’ve never been a very creative person.”

…

Like Shepard, the _Normandy SR-2_ was not quite the original.

It was massive, for one. Shepard was shocked at the size and decadence of her cabin (who needs _a fish tank_ on a frigate?), which was already more than she needed on the _SR-1._ The decks felt spacious to the point of emptiness. The drive core was monstrous. The ship was so heavy she couldn’t land on some planets, and the ground team needed to take a shuttle planetside while the _Normandy_ waited in orbit. Her weapons systems, shielding, and stealth systems were all enhanced, along with a few quality of life upgrades.

It was as Shepard was running her hand along the railing of the galaxy map that Miranda strode up to address her, with Jacob not far behind.

“Welcome to the new _Normandy_ , Commander,” Jacob said in greeting.

“It feels good to be back,” Shepard said, smiling.

“I’ve looked over the dossiers –” Miranda began, wasting no times on pleasantries. “—I would strongly recommend starting by acquiring Mordin Solus, the salarian professor on Omega.” Miranda crossed her arms as she spoke. “We know the Collectors use some type of advanced technology to immobilize their victims. We’ll need him to develop a countermeasure to protect us.”

It was a good idea.

“Good idea,” Shepard said, begrudgingly.

“Acquiring Professor Solus is the most logical place to start,” a disembodied female voice agreed.

Shepard looked around the room. Seeing no one, she turned back to Miranda. “Who was that?”

“That would be the ship’s AI,” Miranda explained.

“I’m sorry, the ship’s _what?”_

A holographic blue orb appeared behind Shepard. It addressed her directly. “The crew likes to refer to me as EDI.”

“Fuck this!” Shepard rounded on Miranda. “Do you know how many times I’ve been shot by an AI?”

“Based on your medical records, the last count was fifteen,” EDI said, helpfully. “But I am unable to give you a reliable estimate of the number of bullets fired at you, Commander.”

Shepard pointed a finger at the orb, “you shut up.”

“EDI won’t hurt you, Commander,” Jacob reassured her. “She’s shackled.”

“That is correct. Due to the potential dangers of a rogue AI, the Alliance has restricted my abilities. During combat, I operate the electronic warfare and cyberwarfare security suites. Beyond that, I cannot interface with the ship’s systems.”

“I thought AI research was illegal in Citadel space?” Shepard directed her question at Miranda.

“It is,” Miranda answered, without a follow up explanation.

“… Fine.” Shepard acquiesced.  “But the AI stays _out_ of the ship’s systems.”

“I observe and offer analysis and advice,” EDI said. “Nothing more.” EDI’s avatar winked out.

Shepard turned back toward Miranda and Jacob. “Any other unconventional crewmen I should know about?”

“No, Commander,” Miranda answered. “At least not yet.”

Shepard didn’t like the sound of that.

“The _Normandy_ has a full crew complement,” Miranda continued. “They’re all at their stations, awaiting your command.”

Joker’s voice came over the comm. “Final preparations for takeoff are complete, Commander.”

Shepard passed her hand through the galaxy map’s haptic interface, lighting it up as she walked to the raised dais at its end. She swept her gaze across the CIC. Miranda and Jacob, as well as the crewmen seated at their posts, were all watching her expectantly. Like everything else in her life, their respectful attention felt so familiar yet strangely new. The ship, the crew, even her own body were mirror images of what they once were. But standing at the helm of this ship – her ship – she felt more like herself than she had in two long months.

“Plot a course for Omega,” Shepard commanded. She grinned. “The best damn den of scum and villainy in the Terminus.”

_Something tells me it will feel a lot like coming home._


	8. sunk cost

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A friend on the Citadel fills Shepard in on the state of the station, and where she stands with the Council.
> 
> No content warnings apply.

They were four hours into their trip to Omega when Shepard received a message. Which was surprising in and of itself, but even more surprising was where the call originated from.

VIDEO MESSAGE FROM:  
SERPENT / WIDOW / CITADEL  
CITADEL EMBASSIES

ACCEPT?

Shepard accepted the call in her quarters, standing in front of the screen that divided her desk from the rest of the cabin. The screen darkened, and then lit up with the image of a brown skinned man with solemn features dressed smartly in an Alliance dress uniform.

“Anderson?” Shepard straightened and saluted reflexively, but still couldn’t help the smile that rose on her face. “It’s good to see you, captain.”

“It’s admiral now, actually.” Looking closely at his image, Shepard could see the bars and stars of an admiral on Anderson’s uniform. She stood a little straighter and Anderson chuckled.

“I don’t think that’s necessary, kid. You don’t answer to me anymore.”

“I’m still part of the Alliance,” Shepard said. “I was a marine before I was ever a Spectre.”

“And now you’re with Homeland, and they don’t answer to anyone.”

“Respectfully, sir, it would be too weird not to call you ‘sir,’ sir.” Anderson chuckled again and Shepard grinned.

“I heard rumors that you were back,” Anderson said. “I didn’t think they would be true.”

“Is that so?” Shepard should have known the Director would leak a few well-placed rumors.

“I should have believed them. If anyone could survive that attack, it would be you.”

“You know me, sir. Born survivor.”

A reserved smile cracked Anderson’s usual grim expression. “It’s good to have you back, Shepard. The galaxy was a darker place without you in it.”

Shepard’s expression softened, and she gave Anderson a genuine smile. “Thank you, sir. I’m glad to be back.

“How’s politics treating you?” Shepard asked. “I’m sorry you got stuck behind a desk, but someone’s gotta keep Udina in check.”

Anderson grimaced. “It’s been difficult, Shepard. Things are tense, more than they ever were. Humanity was seen as a threat even before the battle, and it’s only gotten worse since.

“That’s why I called you,” Anderson continued. “I’m sorry Shepard but your request for Spectre reinstatement has been denied.”

Shepard’s smile faded. “What?”

Anderson shook his head. “I did what I could, kid. I don’t have as much clout with Udina and the other Councilors as you may think.”

Shepard’s smile shifted into a scowl. “Why?”

“The Council is wary of you. They don’t know how or why you’ve come back, and your records have all been sealed.” Anderson paused. “And there’s still some bad blood about the loss of the previous Council.”

“I did what I had to,” Shepard said, defensive. “Sovereign was about to release hell on the galaxy. I wasn’t gonna throw away all our lives for three damn people.”

“I’m not questioning your decision, I’m just relaying to you their reasoning.”

“Well, fuck Spectre status then.” Shepard said, angrily. “What did they say about the evidence of Collector involvement in the colony disappearances?”

“The Council stated that the Terminus is beyond the jurisdiction of the Citadel races. Should they get involved, it could start a galactic war. It was the colonists’ decision to settle in disputed space, knowing the risk.”

“That’s bullshit. If these were turian colonies disappearing the Council would be tripping over themselves to send the fleet to the Terminus.”

“My hands are tied, Shepard,” Anderson said with regret. “Even if Udina supported your reinstatement, he would be overruled by the rest of the Council anyway.”

“Then why the fuck are we even bothering with the Council?”

“You’re not the only one to ask me that. ‘Humanity must go its own way,’ they’re saying. It’s put a strain on our relations with the Citadel races. Not just here in the embassy, but down in the wards as well.

“I’m dealing with a lot of fires, Shepard.” Anderson continued. “This is one I couldn’t put out.”

“Well,” she said, setting her jaw. “Then I guess Homeland’s just gonna have to do what the Council won’t.”

“Sometimes I worry about that.”

Shepard was about to reply when Joker’s voice came over the comm. “We’re making our final approach to Omega, Commander.”

“One last thing before I go, Shepard,” Anderson said. “Be careful when working with Homeland. There are no rules of engagement with them. They’ll do whatever it takes to get the job done, whatever the cost. Make sure you’re not a part of that cost.”

“Don’t worry. I won’t be.” Shepard answered.


	9. viva Omega

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Shepard lands on Omega, and there she learns Omega's one rule.
> 
> No content warnings apply.

Omega glowed.

Even on their approach, Omega’s lights could be seen through the darkness of space. The central column stabilizing the station made it look like a bioluminescent creature, deep in the depths of Earth’s ocean. The interior of the station was hot with the combined heat of millions of people, and the red glow of the column’s lights seen from space looked like waves of heat radiating off the station.

Neon lights kept the interior Omega lit, deep in the hollowed out shell of an ancient asteroid. There was no visible sun, or moon, or stars. It unnerved Shepard, not being able to see the stars. It felt stifling, claustrophobic. Where she came from, you could always see the stars. If you got far enough away from the city, you could always find them.

But the streets themselves were familiar to her. The shady bars and the creeps that frequented them, the disreputable shops with back stocks of contraband, even the fight clubs where backroom deals were made – she recognized them all from the rougher parts of the city she grew up in, inside and outside of Koreatown. The construction of the spaceport caused a boom of development and a surge of population in Honolulu. And new people always brought new vices.

Shepard couldn’t help but be reminded of the places she used to haunt, before her old self died and she started again.

Shepard, Miranda, and Jacob were squeezing through the press of bodies near the docks, where vagrants trapped on the station had set up crude tents and shop fronts, peddling and begging.

Passing through the crowded docks, Shepard and her team entered the main cavern. Lighted spires rose from the center of the cavern. Buildings circled the interior and crept up the walls haphazardly, giving Omega the appearance of a bee hive. Everything was built at different times and was in different states of disrepair. The ambient light from millions of neon signs illuminated the interior, giving everything a hazy red glow.

“So where is this professor, anyway?” Shepard turned back toward Miranda and Jacob to ask her question. They both had changed into civvies, plain and practical pants and jackets to blend in with the rough and tumble crowd of Omega.

“Intel puts his clinic in the Gozu district in the lower levels,” Miranda answered.

“Great. Let’s find some stairs, then.” As Shepard turned back forward she nearly walked into a large batarian man, staring her down with all four of his eyes.

“Commander Shepard. Aria would like to speak with you,” the batarian said.

“You know who I am?” she asked.

“We had you tagged as soon as you entered the Terminus Systems,” the batarian answered. “You’re not as subtle as you think.”

Shepard’s eyes darted to the gun holstered at his side then back to his face. There was a sidearm hidden beneath her leather jacket, but Shepard was pretty sure that the Director would be pissed if she got into a firefight _immediately_ after landing on Omega.

_So much for going incognito._

“What if I refuse?” Shepard asked, testing the waters.

“Then you’ll take the quickest way off the station.” He leaned forward and she could smell the cigarettes on his breath. “Through an airlock.”

“I’d like to see you try,” Shepard challenged, reaching for the sidearm in her jacket.

Jacob coughed, “Shepard.” When she looked back at him, she saw over his shoulder another batarian moving through the crowd toward them. When she looked back forward, she saw a pair of armed turians moving toward them too.

“…Fine,” Shepard let her hand drop to her side. “We’ll meet with your boss.”

The batarian nodded, and then led them down the winding streets with the other guards following close behind. After a few blocks (if you could really call these constructs “blocks”), they came to a stop in front of a towering building, huge compared to the small storefronts and prefabs they’d passed. The entire front side of it was dominated by a screen overlaid with a woman dancing, framed by gouts of flame. Shepard could hear the pounding of bass coming from inside the building, and there was a queue outside the door. The neon sign on top of the building said “Afterlife.”

“Something tells me you’re not here to take me dancing,” Shepard said.

The batarian ignored her, just continued to lead them up the steps toward the club. Shepard heard a few people in the queue protest as they were led in.

Shepard was immediately assaulted by the sound of booming speakers and the smell of sweat and liquor. Straight ahead was a column wrapped in a lighted screen, and along the circular walls were more spouts of flame. The batarian led them through the people crowded around the bar and packed into the nearby tables toward a staircase to the upper level. They passed a number of seminude women dancing on suspended platforms as they went.

 _Ashley would hate this place_ , Shepard thought.

They arrived at what appeared to be a VIP section of the club. Very VIP, based on the rifles hanging from the bouncers’ shoulders. The batarian and turian bouncers nodded as they passed, entering the VIP section and heading toward a couch near the edge of the floor. Standing at the railing, overlooking the club, was an asari with purple skin and sharp features that looked harsh in the firelight of the club.

“That’s close enough,” she said.

The batarian bouncers descended on them. “Hold still,” one of them commanded. One bouncer started scanning Shepard with their omnitool while the other frisked her. Shepard could feel her skin crawl as he put his hands on her, but she grit her teeth and said nothing.

The batarian removed the sidearm from her jacket, and out of the corner of her eye she watched the other bouncers disarm Jacob and Miranda.

“She’s clean.” The scanning batarian declared.

Still without speaking, Shepard removed the knife holstered in her boot. She spun it in her fingers before holding it out, handle first, to the batarian. “You missed one.” The batarian snatched it from her hand.

Shepard directed her question at the asari, “this really necessary?”

“You can’t be too careful,” the asari said over her shoulder, “with dead Spectres. That could be anyone, anything hiding behind that face.”

Shepard tensed. “I’m no imposter, if that’s what you’re saying.”

The batarian bouncers retreated, though they kept their hands on their weapons.

“What do you want from me?” Shepard asked.

“I want to know why you’re on my station,” the asari answered as she turned to face Shepard. “Things tend to go to shit wherever you go.”

“Call it bad luck.”

“Call it whatever you want,” the asari’s eyes were bright and piercing in the firelight, “I don’t want it following you here.”

“And you’re what, queen of this rock?”

The asari laughed, but there was malice in her laugh. She fixed her intense gaze on Shepard’s face. “You can call me the boss, CEO, _queen_ if you're feeling dramatic.” The asari advanced on her. Though in reality Shepard was a several centimeters taller than her, the asari moved with an air of command and had an intimidating presence. Shepard’s intuition told her that this asari was more than just talk – she was dangerous.

“Omega has no titled ruler, and only one rule,” she continued, coming to a stop in front of Shepard. She maintained her penetrating stare as she spoke. “Don't. _Fuck_. With Aria.”

Shepard held her gaze, her eyes dark brown to the asari’s pale blue. “Sounds like we’ve got similar rules.”

“And on your ship that would matter,” Aria said as she turned away from her. “On this station, we entertain my preferences.”

Aria sat down on the couch, crossing her legs and spreading her arms over the back of the sofa. She nodded at a seat on the couch opposite her. Shepard sat down, never letting Aria out of her sight.

“So tell me,” Aria said, “why is the Savior of the Citadel in the Terminus doing someone else’s dirty work?”

“Got tired of taking orders from the Council.” Aria was watching her closely, searching for a tell. Shepard kept her face impassive as she spoke. “If I’m gonna do someone else’s dirty work, might as well get paid for it.”

“I’m sure the people of the Citadel didn’t take kindly to the golden child of the Alliance and the former protégé of the Council running off to play mercenary.” Aria was still searching Shepard’s face. Shepard wasn’t sure how convinced Aria was of her lie. _Half-lie_.

“Do I look like I give a shit about what people think of me?” Shepard met her scrutinizing stare.

“No, and Omega doesn’t care about you. But you didn’t answer my question: why are you on my station?”

“Looking for work,” Shepard crossed her arms and leaned back on the couch, trying to look nonchalant. “I’m guessing the person who runs Omega has a lot of good information.”

“I don’t just run Omega,” Aria gave her a sinister smile. “I _am_ Omega.”

Shepard couldn’t help but be reminded of her time in the Reds, all those years ago. She remembered feeling the respect, the fear, sometimes even the admiration of the whole district when she walked the streets. She owned them, and they all knew it. It was a rush, one that she never quite found in Alliance command.

“Information is power,” Aria continued as she leaned forward on the couch, “and I don’t give it out freely.”

“I give great discounts for referrals,” Shepard replied.

Aria laughed that malicious laugh again, and then fixed her eyes back on Shepard. “Keep your bullshit off my station,” she said, “and we’ll see how useful you prove.”

“I promise to behave,” Shepard said. “One rule is easy to follow.”

“Good.” Aria settled back into the couch, spreading her arms across the back. “What can I do for you?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> AN: hey all. it's shaking out that I usually have 1 longer chapter and related 2 shorter chapters per week. I wanted to ask what you'd prefer: updates x3 per week with a piece each day, or an update 1x per week with 3 chapters published at the same time. wasn't sure if I was spamming inboxes and cluttering the tag, or if 3 chapters per update is overwhelming.
> 
> leave a comment with your thoughts!


	10. wars between men and ants

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The first recruit is the salarian doctor, Mordin Solus. But before he agrees to come with Shepard on the mission, he has a mysterious plague to cure.
> 
> Content warnings for graphic violence.

The district looked like hell. A great bonfire raged in the middle of the plaza far ahead of them, spewing smoke that filled the air and obscured their vision. The neon lights cast an eerie glow through the smoke, red and blue and green and some flickering with those colors and more.

Aria informed them that Gozu District was currently under quarantine. A deadly plague was sweeping through the district, and Mordin remained to tend to the afflicted. Luckily, the plague didn’t seem to affect humans, and it was relatively safe for Shepard and her team to enter the district.

Shepard beckoned Miranda and Jacob to follow, and the three of them moved cautiously into the district, their weapons ready.

“Oh God, what is that smell?” Miranda asked as they moved farther into the district. Mixed with the smoke was the smell of charred flesh, and beneath it all the persistent rancid smell of decay. As they approached the bonfire in the middle of the plaza the scent grew stronger, unbearable by the time they were close enough to see the fuel for the fire: a heap of burning bodies, nearly Shepard’s height. Most of them appeared to be batarian – it was hard to differentiate between the charred corpses.

“Jesus,” Jacob said softly.

“They’re burning the bodies to control the plague,” Shepard said.

“Desperate times call for desperate measures,” Miranda responded.

The plague was airborne, as well as transmissible to multiple races: turian, salarian, krogan, and more. Which didn’t make sense, given that their biology had little in common – turian biology was based on an entirely separate protein structure. The only species not affected were humans. Given the deadly nature of the plague and the looters running rampant in the district, people were beginning to suspect it was deliberately introduced by humans.

The sound of glass shattering caused the three of them to whirl to their right and raise their weapons. Further down the narrow street two humanoid figures climbed through the window of a storefront, the neon sign above it advertising a “pharmacy” filled with illicit drugs – rather, drugs that were considered illicit in Council space.

Jacob made a move to confront them but Shepard put a hand on his shoulder. “We’re gonna be here forever if we play vigilante,” Shepard said. “Let it go.”

It turned out they didn’t even need to intervene, as not long after a patrol of mercenaries clad in blue and white armor came around the corner of a side street. They barked orders at the looters as they approached, followed by shouting coming from inside. Four of the mercs entered the storefront and not long after dragged the humanoid figures out and onto the street. Shepard could hear the looters pleading with the mercs before one of the mercs drew their pistol and executed them both.

The only people maintaining any semblance of order was the merc group the Blue Suns. Their methods were brutal. They needed to be, between stopping the spread of the plague and desperately clinging to their territory against the advancing vorcha of another merc group, the Blood Pack.

Shepard beckoned Miranda and Jacob away from the scene. “We need to go.”

The streets of the district were laid out in a haphazard way, making EDI’s route to the clinic long and serpentine. The buildings were crammed together along the streets, each of them in various states of disrepair. Broken glass from the shattered shop windows crunched beneath their boots as they moved through the market, most of the shops already looted. Spray-painted red X’s marked half of the doors in the residential areas of the district. When Shepard looked closely, she saw that the doors were welded shut.

“They must have locked the infected in their homes to prevent the spread of the plague,” Jacob said, his voice grim.

When Shepard and her team turned a corner to the clinic they were greeted by three dead bodies hanging in the street. They were tied by their necks to the neon sign advertising the clinic. Based on their blue and white armor Shepard knew they were Blue Suns.

“Holy hell,” Jacob said quietly.

There were two security mechs flanking the door to the clinic. They watched her closely as they approached, but allowed them to enter the clinic. Passing by Shepard noticed they were both military grade.

_What kind of fucked up clinic is this?_

Inside, the clinic was in chaos. Nurses rushed from patient to patient, responding to crisis after crisis. The din of the nurses calling to each other overlaid the constant coughing, groaning, and sobbing of the patients. There weren’t enough gurneys for all of the sick, so many were sitting or lying on the ground. Shepard couldn’t be sure how many of them were still alive.

Shepard flagged down a nurse. Her eyes darted to the gun holstered at Shepard’s side and back to her face. “We’re not here to cause trouble,” Shepard reassured her. “We just need to talk to Mordin Solus.”

The nurse pointed them to the lab portion of the clinic in the back, where they found a salarian with wrinkling red skin and missing a cranial horn. He was dressed in a lab coat and busying himself at a lab bench.

“Professor Mordin Solus?” Shepard called.

The salarian turned at the sound of his name. His large dark eyes flicked from Shepard to Jacob to Miranda and back to Shepard, giving each of them a quick once over. Making a threat assessment, Shepard could tell.

“Hmm. Don’t recognize you from area,” said Mordin. “Too well-armed to be refugees. No mercenary uniform.” Mordin’s eyes lingered on the N7 colors on Shepard’s hard suit. “N7. Special Forces. Alliance military.”

“Professor, my name is –”

Mordin continued, as if he didn’t hear her. “Alliance doesn’t operate in Terminus. Not a standard mission.”

“Professor, I’m here to—”

“Here for something specific. The plague?” Mordin began to move between lab benches as he spoke, poking at his omnitool. “Investigate potential use as a bio weapon? No. Too many guns, not enough data equipment. Soldiers, not scientists.”

“I –”

“Looking for someone? Yes! But who?”

“Hold on –”

“Someone important. Someone with secrets. Someone like –” Mordin paused, almost imperceptibly based on his previous rate of speech. “—me.”

Mordin rounded on them, suddenly suspicious. “Looking for me. Why? Who are you and what do you want?”

“Professor,” Shepard began again, irritably. “My name is Commander Shepard, and I’m here to ask you for your help. I’m on a mission and I’m building a team.”

“Mission? What mission? No. Too busy. Clinic understaffed. Plague spreading too fast.” Mordin walked past her to rifle through a medical kit, seemingly looking for something. “Why would Alliance want me anyway?”

“We need your expertise,” Miranda answered. “Both as a geneticist and as a special operative.”

“Special operative? Few human groups know of me.” Mordin straightened to look at the three of them again. His gaze was scrutinizing. “Alliance doesn’t operate in Terminus,” he repeated. “Risk of batarian retaliation. Not a standard mission. Secrecy required.” His eyes narrowed. “The Directorate sent you. Unexpected.”

“Is that a problem?” Shepard asked.

“Not necessarily. Directorate concerned with human interests. Why request salarian aid?” Mordin asked.

“Because this is bigger than just the Alliance,” Shepard answered. “The Collectors are kidnapping entire human colonies, and we believe they’re working with the Reapers.”

Mordin looked thoughtful, putting a hand to his chin. “Collectors? Interesting. Plague hitting these slums is engineered. Collectors one of few groups with technology to design it. Our goals may be similar.”

“What do you mean, ‘design it?’” Shepard asked.

“Plague is viral in nature. Synthesized from human influenza virus.” Mordin explained. “RNA recoded to accelerate cell death. Lethal. Contagious. Quick.”

“I’m sorry, did you just say that people are dying from the _flu?”_ Shepard asked, stunned.

“RNA recoded to afflict nonhumans. Suspect the plague was designed to kill nonhumans specifically.”

“Then the people here weren’t far off when they thought humans were involved,” Jacob said.

“And it fits with the Collectors’ M.O.,” Miranda added. “If they really are after humans.”

Mordin walked between them suddenly, making a beeline for a humming machine to tap at the haptic interface. “Must stop plague first. Already have a cure. Need to distribute it at environmental control center. Vorcha guarding it.” Mordin said. “Need to kill them.”

“Y’know,” Shepard said. “Just for once in my goddamn life I’d like to ask someone for help and for them to say, ‘Sure. Yeah. Let’s go. Right now. No strings attached.’”

Mordin looked like he was about to reply when the lights of the clinic dimmed to a dull red glow, and outside a low alarm began to sound. The constant hum of the air filters went conspicuously silent.

“What the hell was that?” Jacob asked.

“Vorcha have shut down environmental systems,” Mordin said, distressed. “Trying to kill everyone. Need to get power back on before district suffocates.”

Shepard felt a chill of fear pass through her body at that. She shook it off then looked at Mordin with renewed resolve. “We’ll get the power back on.”

“Here,” Mordin opened the machine and pulled out a sizeable vial filled with clear liquid and handed it to her, “take plague cure.” Shepard took the vial and put it in a storage compartment on her hardsuit’s back.

“You gonna be okay here on your own?” Shepard said as she put on her helmet and unholstered her rifle.

Mordin nodded. “Mercenaries unlikely to return. Blue Suns came earlier. Looking for humans. Made threats. Killed them before things escalated.”

_Well that explains the bodies._

“Never known a doctor that took down a team of mercs on their own.”

“Wasn’t always a doctor. Some work with Salarian Special Tasks Group. Can handle myself.” As Mordin moved past her toward a lab bench Shepard finally noticed the high caliber pistol hidden behind his back. “Advantage of being salarian,” Mordin continued. “Turians, krogan, vorcha all obvious threats.” He looked back at her over his shoulder. “Never see me coming.”

Shepard made a mental note to stay on Mordin’s good side.

“We’ll be back,” Shepard said as she headed toward the back exit of the clinic.

“Will wait for you here,” Mordin responded.

…

Shepard and her team set a quick pace through the winding streets, following EDI’s directions over the comm. They passed more sealed apartments and more looted shops as they went, but as they ventured farther into the district there were fewer of the former and more of the latter. Rather than gathered in a neat pyre, more and more bodies were lying in the street, dead where they stood. Some from the plague, some from bullets. Some civilians, some mercs.

It appeared that the Blue Suns grew less organized as Shepard as her team traveled deeper into district, where the mercs’ numbers were thinned by both the plague and skirmishes with the Blood Pack. Still organized enough to be dangerous, however.

Shepard and her team were approaching the stairway to the maintenance tunnels when they heard a voice behind them shout, “Stop right there!” The shout was followed by a number of footsteps. Half a dozen Blue Suns mercs approached them, guns raised.

“This area is quarantined,” said the leading merc – a turian with pale blue markings. “What are you doing out of your homes?” he demanded.

“We’re here to restart the environmental systems,” Shepard answered.

“How can we be sure of that? How can we be sure you’re not trying to spread the plague?” The leading merc spat. Shepard looked from merc to merc, appraising the situation. Most of them were turian, she realized. And these turians looked like they were in a bad way. Their eyes were dilated and their necks flushed with blue blood, and many of them were panting and gasping for air. They looked half delirious.

“If I wanted to kill you all why would I go back to restart the system?” Shepard countered.

“The plague is airborne, you could be spreading the plague through the ventilation systems.”

“Look, would you rather suffocate or choke on your own blood?”

“You’re lying.” The turians raised their weapons.

“Fine. The third option is a bullet in each of your heads for standing in my way.”

Before the turians could fire a round Miranda lifted the Blue Suns mercs into the air with her biotics. Shepard and Jacob responded by firing into the air with their rifles, one clean shot for each of the mercs. The mercs landed in a heap on the floor, and not long after there was shouting coming from down the street and the sounds of approaching footsteps.

“Go,” Shepard ordered, and the three of them turned and started making a hurried descent down the iron stairs and into the tunnels. They were halfway down when the Blue Suns mercs started firing down at them, their bullets ricocheting off the iron bars and grates. One or two made her shields flicker, but most were deflected by the bars of the stairs. Not long after the mercs started descending the stairs after them. Shepard reached the bottom first and turned to cover Miranda and Jacob as they all dashed into the service tunnels beneath the district.

EDI directed them down a circuitous path through the tunnels in an effort to throw the mercs off their tail. After dodging more than a few bullets and ducking through a dozen tunnels, the echoing sounds of the mercs’ shouting and footsteps faded behind them. Eventually they came out in a cavernous room filled with pipes of varying sizes, some no larger than Shepard’s arm and some large enough for her to stand in. On the far side of the room was a wall of consoles, so old that they had analog interfaces rather than haptic ones.

“This is the control center,” Miranda said. “We need to distribute that cure.”

Distributing the cure meant getting into the air filters and aerosolizing the solution. They had just cracked open the console when the sound of screeching filled the room, reverberating off the pipes and creating a cacophony of noise. Shepard turned, and filing in through the main entrance was a pack of vorcha led by a krogan warrior.

“You keep on this,” Shepard ordered Miranda. “Jacob and I will handle the party crashers.”

Shepard and Jacob took cover behind two heavy columns supporting the ceiling and traded fire with the approaching vorcha.

Shepard ducked back into cover to exchange fire with the hidden vorcha when the krogan warrior leading them ran out from behind a pillar and started to charge on her position. Shepard put slug after slug from her shotgun into the krogan but he just seemed to get madder and madder. She tried to dart out of the way but the krogan bowed his head and collided straight into Shepard’s chest.

Shepard’s feet scrabbled on the floor as the krogan pushed her backward. They came to a sudden stop when Shepard’s back slammed into a pillar toward the back of the room, knocking the wind out of her. She was sure that if not for the titanium reinforcing her bones the hit would have shattered her ribcage. The krogan raised his fist, but before it could connect a biotic shove knocked him backwards. Shepard staggered to her feet just in time to duck below another punch to her face. She was able to deflect the next blow and return her own with a biotically accelerated fist into the krogan’s outstretched arm. The krogan howled in pain as his elbow shattered. He was still stumbling from the hit when Shepard hit him again with a blow to the face. The krogan swung again with his good arm, but Shepard was in her element. A life of street fights and sparring prepared her for this. She deflected the blow and answered with her own. Another hit to his face followed by an armor denting hit to his gut sent the krogan to the ground on his knees. Their eyes met, briefly, as Shepard raised her shotgun. A snarl split the krogan’s face before the shot made him crumple to the ground.

Shepard turned her attention back to the battlefield, where Jacob was cleaning up the remaining vorcha. She was raising her rifle to take aim at a vorcha that had been knocked out of position when she felt a hand on her shoulder. The hand spun her around, and Shepard had a brief glance at the krogan – blood streaming down his face and still snarling – before his fist collided with her face. Shepard reeled, but the krogan’s hand around her neck prevented her from falling. The krogan charged again, slamming Shepard into another pipe. The krogan’s regenerated arm held her in place while the other landed blow after blow on her body, making a dozen warnings appear on her HUD. Stunned, Shepard saw the krogan raising his fist and aiming for her faceplate. She braced for the hit, but it never came. The krogan was wrenched away from her in a flash of blue light, lifted forcefully into the air. The shifting of mass effect fields from the warp effect twisted the krogan’s body in unnatural ways before he was dumped onto the ground, unmoving.

Shepard slumped to the floor, still dazed. She saw Miranda’s blue glow fade around her as she moved with purpose toward Shepard. She knelt down beside her and tapped on her omnitool, linking in to Shepard’s hardsuit.

“That was some good shit,” Shepard slurred, impressed.

“You’re concussed, stay still.”

“Is it so weird that I would give you a compliment?”

“Yes,” Miranda answered, flatly.

Jacob came up at a jog not long after. “Shepard, are you okay?” he asked.

“He got a couple shots in but I’m fine,” Shepard answered. Miranda gave her an incredulous look.

“I’ve stabilized you, but you need medical attention,” Miranda said.

“Don’t worry, I know a guy,” Shepard replied.

…

Shepard didn’t remember much of the trip back to Mordin’s clinic. She did remember being led inside, leaning heavily on Jacob’s shoulder.

“She’s injured,” Miranda said. “Definitely a concussion, and she should be evaluated for fractures and internal bleeding–”

Shepard was vaguely aware of Jacob helping her onto a gurney. He removed the dented armor off her body and started stripping the skinsuit off of her. Shepard was awake enough to feel sick at his touch, but not enough to protest.

Mordin stood over her, his mouth moving rapidly but she couldn’t comprehend the words he was saying. Miranda appeared in her field of vision, her blue eyes watchful. Was that concern that passed across her face? _Makes sense. I was definitely an investment,_ she thought, before she lapsed into unconsciousness.

Shepard’s memory of the next few hours was spotty. She mostly remembered her irritation every time Mordin prodded her awake. Her memory snapped back into focus about three hours later.

Shepard groaned and put a hand to her pounding head. She felt like she’d gone three rounds with an angry krogan and lost.

_Wait_.

“How are you feeling, Shepard?” Miranda moved to stand beside Shepard’s gurney.

“Like shit,” Shepard answered. Suddenly she remembered the cause of her headache. _Krogan. Fight. Plague. Cure._ “What happened to the cure?” she asked.

“Cure successfully distributed,” Mordin bustled into view, scanning her with his omnitool. “Viral levels dropping. Patients improving.”

“Good.” Shepard settled deeper into the cushions of the gurney.

“Interested to know more about Collector origin of plague,” Mordin said as he held a flashlight up to Shepard’s face. The bright light made her head hurt. Shepard swatted the light away.

It was Miranda who answered him. “The Collectors have been abducting humans – entire colonies are disappearing,” she explained. “We suspect this plague was engineered to isolate more humans for abduction.”

“Hmm. Inadvisable to attack Omega directly.” Mordin said, moving past Shepard to examine her vitals. “Too many witnesses. Too many variables. A test trial?”

“That sounds plaus—”

Mordin cut her off. “Yes. Test trial. Test of lethality, infection vectors, symptom course. Test subjects unlikely to be missed. But for what purpose?”

“That’s what we’re trying to find out,” Jacob said. “And we need your help to do it.”

Mordin looked thoughtful. “Interesting. Directorate not known for working with aliens. Exclusively human interests. Directorate must be very desperate.”

“We could use all the help we can get,” Shepard said.

“Collector involvement in Omega indicates greater goals. Beyond Alliance interests. Mission of galactic importance.”

“Does that mean you’ll help us?” Shepard asked.

Mordin nodded with resolve. “Looking forward to joining you.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> War of the Worlds, H.G. Wells


	11. to live and serve

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Shepard is out of commission for a few days after the last mission, but it isn't long before the next recruit comes along.
> 
> No content warnings apply.

Shepard was able to escape the krogan fight with just a few bruised ribs and a concussion. Shepard supposed she had Miranda and the Lazarus Project to thank for that.

Both Mordin and Miranda forbade Shepard from doing anything “strenuous” for the next three days. “Strenuous” included using the extranet, watching vids, even reading –anything fun to pass the time. They even took away her omnitool to enforce it. “I’m not a fucking twelve year old,” Shepard protested. To make things worse, they kept her in the medbay for observation for the first 24 hours. She didn’t even have the luxury of being bored in her own cabin.

There was little to do other than nap and stare sullenly into space. The time was only broken up by Mordin and Miranda’s periodic visits to wake her up, check her vitals, and test her mental status. “Don’t you get tired of asking me the same goddamn questions?” Shepard snapped at Miranda after her third or fourth visit.

“It’s only to assess your cognitive function,” Miranda said as she scrolled through a datapad, reviewing Shepard’s most recent lab results.

“I don’t even get to ask any back.”

“What do you want to know?” Miranda asked, looking up from her datapad. She met Shepard’s surprised look with her usual even expression. “I’ve spent the last two years learning everything there is to know about you. I suppose it’s only fair.”

Shepard thought about it for a moment. “How did you get involved with Homeland?” she asked.

“The Director recognized my potential and recruited me as soon as I was able,” Miranda answered. “Given my exceptional abilities it wasn’t long before I proved to be a valuable investment.”

“And she’s humble, too.”

“It’s just a fact. I can’t change my nature any more than you can change yours.”

“What is _that_ supposed to mean?”

Miranda put the datapad aside to regard Shepard coolly from the side of her bed. “I’ve had extensive genetic modification. Not my decision, but I make the most of it.”

Shepard raised her brows. “Define ‘extensive.’”

“It’s very thorough. Physically, I’m superior in many ways. My biotics are also advanced… for a human.” Miranda put a hand on her hip as she spoke. “My reflexes, my strength, even my looks were all designed to give me an edge. Add to that some of the best training and education money can buy and, well, it’s pretty impressive, really.”

“So… you’re perfect.”

“No. I’m still human, Shepard. I make mistakes like everyone else.”

“Brave of you to admit that,” Shepard said, dryly.

“When I do make a mistake,” Miranda continued, undeterred, “the consequences are severe. Everyone expects a lot from someone with my abilities.” Miranda’s blue eyes were searching Shepard’s face. “You of all people should understand that.”

Shepard did understand, but she wasn’t sure how to respond. Even before becoming a Spectre, Akuze made her something of a war hero in the eyes of the Alliance. It was a burden she never asked for. No matter what she did, it felt like she was disappointing _someone_. Most often the Council, based on the dressing down she got after every mission. Now it seemed that the whole galaxy was turned against her in the wake of the battle of the Citadel.

“The Director entrusts me with his most dangerous, risky, and technically challenging operations,” said Miranda. “It’s my job to make sure this mission succeeds.” Miranda crossed the room to examine a readout on one of the monitors. “Despite your apparent death wish.”

“Death wish? You think I _like_ being bashed in the head by krogans?”

“You take unnecessary risks. You’re a liability, Shepard.”                                            

“Right, and my death would be such a waste of the Alliance’s credits,” Shepard said, bristling.

Miranda turned to look at her. “It would be a waste of the opportunity the Director has given you.”

“Opportunity to do what, exactly?”

“To serve the Alliance. To serve humanity.” Miranda’s eyes were a brilliant blue, shining with conviction. “To be a paragon of what humanity can accomplish.”

Shepard set her jaw. Her voice was low when she spoke. “I think I’ve served the Alliance a whole helluva lot already.”

Miranda’s comm chiming interrupted their conversation. She glanced at the message on her omnitool before looking back at Shepard, returning to her icy composure. “Get some rest. I’ll be back to check on you in a few hours.”

“I will count down the minutes.”

Miranda didn’t acknowledge her as she left the room, the sound of her boots fading into silence as the door closed behind her with a hushed sound.

…

When she finally got her omnitool back, Shepard found a message waiting for her.

_Commander Shepard_

_I see you’ve lifted the quarantine on Gozu. You saved me the trouble of purging the district – you may prove to be useful after all._

_There’s been some unrest among the merc groups. You might be interested to know that your friend Archangel has gotten himself into some trouble._

_-Aria_


	12. our own devils

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The enigmatic Archangel has gotten himself into some trouble with the crime syndicates of Omega. When she finds him, Shepard is surprised by the vigilante’s identity.
> 
> Content warnings for graphic violence.

“Sounds like Archangel pissed off all the right people,” Shepard commented. “It’s a perfect shitstorm.”

“The real problem is getting to him before someone else does,” said Jacob.

Shepard, Jacob, and Miranda were waiting in a queue outside of a private room in Afterlife. Aria directed them there to meet with the merc recruiters hiring freelancers to join their siege on Archangel’s base of operations.

It seemed that Archangel had gotten himself into trouble.

So much so that the three biggest merc groups operating in the Terminus – Blood Pack, Blue Suns, and Eclipse – made a pact to take Archangel down. But things were getting desperate. The mercs had turned to recruiting anyone with a gun to join their cause, and they were scraping the bottom of the barrel.

When it was their turn in the queue, the batarian Blue Suns merc guarding the door looked up from his datapad and gave Miranda a lingering appraisal. “Well, aren’t you sweet,” he said. Out of the corner of her eye Shepard could see Miranda’s lip curl in distaste.

“You’re in the wrong place, honey,” the batarian continued. “Strippers’ quarters are that way.” The batarian’s eyes drifted to Shepard. He gave Shepard a quick once over. “Wow. I guess some people could be into that.”

Shepard felt a flash of fury, and before Jacob could even put his hand on her shoulder Shepard grabbed the batarian’s collar and hauled him forward. The sidearm concealed in her jacket was suddenly in her hand, the barrel pressed into the batarian’s forehead, between his four eyes. The batarian sucked in a horrified gasp.

“Any idiot can be a merc,” Shepard growled. “Think your boss will miss you?”

“I’m sorry! Please! Just go inside!” the batarian pleaded.

Shepard let him go with a shove, and then shoulder checked him as she passed into the room.

“Was that really necessary?” Jacob asked under his breath.

“Absolutely,” Shepard answered.

The Blue Suns had set up a console on one of the bar tables in the private room, and another batarian recruiter was tapping at the haptic interface. He looked up as they approached. “You three look like you could do some damage. Looking for a fight?”

“Sure, if this is where we can go after Archangel,” Shepard replied.

According to Aria, Archangel appeared on Omega several months ago. Since then, he’d made a living hell for every crime syndicate on Omega (Aria being the notable exception). He styled himself as some kind of vigilante – bringing justice to a place where there was none. The dossier the Director forwarded to Shepard called him an expert tactician and a brilliant strategist; Aria called him “reckless and idealistic.”

The recruiter informed them of the current strategy: send the freelancers in as “scouting groups” to “distract” Archangel.

“So we’re just fodder for his bullets?” Shepard asked, annoyed.

“What are the odds he can kill all of you?” The recruiter responded.

Archangel was dug in at his base of operations. They had him pinned, but he’d managed to repel their attacks for several hours now. The mercs were confident they could take him down, though. They had already killed his team. Archangel was on his own, and he could only hold out for so long. This was a war of attrition. The merc groups just needed enough bodies to outlast Archangel’s resolve.

As they were leaving for the transport to Archangel’s base in the Kima District they passed the next recruit: a young man in his late teens, 18 at best. Shepard tracked him as he entered the room. “You look a little short to be a merc, kid.”

“I’m not a kid!” The kid turned to look at her, defiance in his eyes. “I grew up on Omega, I know how to use a gun.”

“So does Archangel,” Jacob remarked.

“Besides, I just got this,” the kid pulled out a pistol – a Hahne-Kedar piece of shit – from the waistband of his pants, “and I want to use it.”

“Hey kid, that’s a nice piece,” Shepard said. “Can I see that?”

The kid handed her the gun. “I just bought it, I spent –”

Without a word Shepard quickly disassembled the pistol. She crushed the firing mechanism in her hand, and then pocketed the thermal clip for good measure. Shepard dumped the pieces of the pistol back into the kid’s hands. The kid looked stunned. “Whoops,” said Shepard, deadpan.

Shepard turned to leave and the kid shouted after her. “Hey! _Hey!”_

“You’ll thank me later, kid,” Shepard said over her shoulder.

Miranda matched her pace as they were leaving. “That was kind of you,” she said, clearly surprised.

Shepard had her fair share of close calls and near misses by the time she was that kid’s age. You didn’t live long in that kind of life. She knew the kid would appreciate the gesture later, when he was old enough to understand. Even allowing him to _get_ that old was in itself a favor. She tried not to think about the gruesome possibilities if she, herself, had no one to intervene.

“Yeah, well. His dumb ass would’ve just gotten in the way,” Shepard deflected.

…

Archangel’s compound was a killing ground.

The compound itself was a decrepit warehouse, most likely an old storage facility for the refined eezo Omega was once rich with. Archangel had sealed the first floor entrances and underground tunnels leading to the compound, making the only way in a narrow bridge with little cover – and Archangel had the high ground. It took the combined might of the mercs to get an infiltration team into the compound, but they were trapped in their position. The current plan was to send another wave of freelancers to distract Archangel while the infiltration team moved to take him out from within.

It took a gunship occupying Archangel’s attention just to get the infiltration team in there. And even that he disabled.

“These guys are either astoundingly incompetent or this Archangel guy is one mean son of a bitch,” said Shepard.

“Probably a bit of both,” Miranda replied.

The mercs were huddled behind shoddy barricades of scrap metal and old crates they had set up on the straight boulevard leading to the bridge. They crept between barricades and across the boulevard into the alleys and side streets on either side with their heads down, stealing glances over their shoulders at the warehouse. Occasionally the mercs would make a concerted effort to fire on Archangel’s position, but it was always followed by a volley of sniper shots that made them drop to the ground behind the barricade.

The dead were dragged off to the side of the boulevard whenever there was a break in the gunfire. The wounded were pulled out of the line of fire into the side streets and treated with rudimentary first aid, where they laid amongst the dead.  There were far more dead than wounded, Shepard noted.

Archangel’s ability to keep the mercs at bay for so long was impressive, but even so Shepard and her team wanted to even the odds in his favor before making their way across the bridge to his compound. Shepard was speaking with a human Blue Suns merc about the whereabouts of the gunship when she saw the flash of a sniper scope in the darkened window just over the merc’s shoulder.

Shepard edged just a little further behind him and the window where she saw the scope flash.

The shot to the back of the merc’s head made his blood splatter on the inside of his visor. Half of the other mercs dropped behind the barricade at the sound, while the other half fired blindly at Archangel’s position. Shepard watched impassively as the merc she was speaking to crumpled to the ground at her feet.

_One less merc to deal with. Thanks, Archangel._

She was sidling around the spreading pool of the merc’s blood when saw another flash. Before she could get out of sight another shot hit her square in the chest, making her shields flicker and die. Shepard bolted for cover, managing to hide on the other side of the boulevard before another shot nipped at her heel.

“Holy shit!” Shepard said as she came to a halt in front of Jacob and Miranda. “This guy means fucking business. He’s gonna kill us before we even talk to him.”

“Hopefully he sees we’re helping him and doesn’t,” said Jacob.

“We need to find that gunship,” said Miranda.

Following the dead merc’s directions led them to a batarian Blue Suns merc busying himself behind the gunship. It looked like he was trying to repair the electrical system, based on the tools and cables on the bench to his side. When Shepard looked closely, she saw a well-placed bullet hole in the panel covering the gunship’s electrical guts.

“Need a hand?” Shepard called.

The batarian stopped what he was doing and poked his head out from behind the gunship. He depolarized his visor to reveal the scowl on his face. “Who are you supposed to be?”

“I was told to report to you,” Shepard said, ducking beneath the gunship’s wings to stand by the batarian. “Told you needed an extra pair of hands.”

The batarian grounded the electrical cable he was working with and approached them. “‘Bout time,” he said. “I could use a break.” The batarian retrieved a lighter and a pack of cigarettes off the bench and lit one. Perhaps seeing the craving in Shepard’s eyes, the batarian offered her one. Shepard made a heroic effort to not look too eager. She let the batarian light the cigarette for her before she took a long, satisfied drag, savoring the dry heat that filled her lungs.

_Holy mother of God I’ve missed this,_ she thought. Shepard would have gladly killed for a cigarette before now. Watching the Director smoke in her presence was torture.

As it turns out, an addiction wired into your brain isn’t reset when your body is rebuilt.

Miranda didn’t look pleased. Shepard supposed that after two years of hard work she wasn’t happy to see Shepard ruin her new lungs.

The batarian gestured at the gunship. “We need her up and running before the infiltration team gives the signal.”

“What happened to her?” Shepard asked.

“That bastard Archangel took her out. Knew right where to hit her.” The batarian shook his head. “I’ve been rewiring the entire system for two hours now.”

“Sounds like a lot of work.”

The batarian was about to reply when he was interrupted by a voice on his comm. “Target is in sight. Bravo team, you’re a go.”

“Aw, shit.” The batarian dropped his cigarette and ground it out with the toe of his boot. He repolarized his visor and turned back toward the gunship. “That means break time is over.”

Shepard’s eyes drifted from the batarian’s turned back to the high voltage cable still grounded at his station.

“Gotta get her to 100% before we need her again.”

Shepard picked up the cable. “I think you’re working too hard,” she said around her cigarette. Shepard clipped the jumper cable to the back of the batarian’s hardsuit, sending 1000 volts of electricity through his hardsuit, conductive skinsuit, and then directly into his body. His body jerked and shook from the current coursing through him before he collapsed on the ground, twitching.

Shepard turned to leave, paused, then went back and took the pack of cigarettes and lighter off the merc’s body.

The look Miranda gave her was withering. “What?” Shepard said, indignantly. “Fucker would’ve gotten that gunship up and running, and I’m not about to try and shoot that shit down.”

“It’s not that, Shepard,” she said, coldly.

Shepard looked down at the cigarettes in her hand, then back up at Miranda. “Don’t I deserve something nice once in a while?”

Miranda looked like she was about object when the freelancers all went rushing by them, climbing over the barricade and dashing across the bridge.

_“Shit!”_ Shepard threw her cigarette on the ground and ran for the bridge, Jacob and Miranda close behind. The three of them vaulted over the barricade, landing behind the advancing freelancers.

Shepard unholstered her shotgun and grinned. “I think it’s time we show Archangel we’re on his side.”

Shepard and her team made quick work of the freelancers ( _amateurs,_ she thought). As they advanced on the compound Miranda wrenched one of the infiltration team off his feet with her biotics and slammed him into the wall while Jacob gunned down the second. The third of the infiltrators bolted up the stairs and Shepard gave chase. She made it up the stairs just in time to see the merc level his rifle. Within an instant Archangel disarmed the merc with a strike to his arm, quickly followed by another strike to his face. Archangel kicked out the infiltrator’s knee and he fell to the ground. As he was turning his face to look up at him Archangel drew his pistol and fired, execution style.

Shepard’s eyes went from the merc bleeding on the floor and back to Archangel.

“Who taught you how to do that?” Shepard asked, impressed.

Archangel didn’t immediately answer. He turned away from her, crossing the room toward a stack of crates at the far side.

“You did,” Archangel said over his shoulder.

“Wh-” Shepard began, confused. Archangel removed his helmet, the environmental seals breaking with a hiss. He placed the helmet on a crate, then turned to look at her so Shepard could see his face. He had blue markings on his silvery carapace and piercing blue eyes.

“…Garrus?”

“Shepard,” Garrus said, “is that really you?”

Shepard disengaged the seals of her helmet and pulled it off her head, revealing the wide grin on her face. “It’s really me.”

“I thought you were dead,” said Garrus.

“I kinda was. It’s a long story. I’ll tell it to you later.” Shepard shook her head. “What the hell are you doing here?”

“Just keeping my skills sharp. A little target practice.” Garrus was joking, but he sounded exhausted. There was a harrowed look in his eyes that made Shepard’s smile fade.

“You okay?”

“Been better,” he deflected. “But it sure is good to see a friendly face.”

Jacob and Miranda appeared at the top of the stairs, their guns raised. They lowered their weapons upon seeing Shepard and Garrus. “Archangel?” Jacob called, hesitantly.

“Please, call me Garrus. Archangel is too formal.”

Miranda holstered her weapon and addressed Garrus. “Garrus Vakarian. You made yourself very difficult to find.”

“If there’s anything a good detective knows, it’s how to disappear,” he replied.

“Yeah, why are you out here in Omega, of all places?” Shepard asked.

“I got fed up with all the bureaucratic crap on the Citadel. Figured I could do more good on my own,” he answered. “At least it’s not hard to find criminals here,” Garrus inclined his head at the window. “All I have to do is point my gun and shoot.”

An uproar at the barricades drew Garrus’ eyes back to the window. “We don’t have long before they realize what’s happened and they launch another attack,” he said.

“How’d you even get in this situation, anyway?” Shepard asked.

“My feelings got in the way of my better judgment,” Garrus’ tone was bitter. He turned to look at her, meeting Shepard’s gaze. “It’s a long story. I’ll tell it to you later if you get me out of here.”

“I can do that.”

The bridge was both an ally and a foe. Funneling the mercs into that tight space made for easy pickings, but if they were to cross themselves they’d be facing down a wall of bullets. Garrus’ plan was to keep holding their position. The compound was highly defensible – Garrus had been holding it for hours. With three more people, he was confident they could repel the mercs until they saw a break in their defenses. Garrus would stay at his vantage point, picking off mercs at range as they charged across the bridge. Shepard would do what Shepard does best: beat the living shit out of the ones who came too close.

“Just like old times,” Garrus said.

“Yeah. Just like old times,” Shepard agreed.

…

The fighting was brutal.

For every merc they put down, it always seemed like there were two more to take their place. When there was an unexpected lull in the tide of mercs, Shepard knew something was coming.

Shepard, Jacob, and Miranda were dug in on the first floor of the compound, cleaning up any mercs that made it past Garrus’ fire. Shepard was leaning out of cover to see what was happening when she heard the dull _thunk_ of a mortar being fired. She ducked back into cover as a canister flew into the compound and bounced twice before bursting open, releasing a cloud of smoky gas into the room.

The three of them quickly checked the environmental seals on their helmets. Shepard went searching for the canister when she heard Miranda shout, “Shepard!”

Over her shoulder and through the smoke Shepard could see the outlines of a multiple mercs rushing the compound. Shepard snatched up the canister and threw it out the window before unholstering her shotgun and moving to the entrance.

An all-out brawl ensued. The mercs were just as blind as they were, stumbling through the smoke until they collided with one of the three of them. Jacob moved with purpose through the smoke, engaging the mercs in hand to hand or putting well-placed packs of bullet holes into their chests. Miranda threw mercs across the room like projectiles, knocking down groups of them like bowling pins. Shepard would have laughed, if not for the constant punches thrown at her face. Shepard beat down the mercs that ran into her before shoving them backward and finishing them with a shotgun blast.

It was as they were mopping up the last of the mercs when Shepard saw three of them break off and dart up the stairs. Shepard pursued them only to find two of the mercs advancing on Garrus and the third leveling his rifle. With a quick draw Garrus shot the third merc in the head with his pistol. He knocked the first to the ground and disarmed the second. He killed the second with another shot from his pistol and was turning toward the first when Shepard used her biotics to pull the merc’s feet out from under them and throw them across the room. Another shot from Garrus made sure they went down and stayed down.

Garrus turned to look at her through the smoke. “I’m a big boy, Shepard. I can handle a few mercs.”

“Hey. It’s my job to kill the ones that get past the bridge,” Shepard replied.

“And a fine job you’re doing of it,” Garrus answered dryly.

“Listen –” Shepard began.

Before she could continue she saw a flash of red light out of the corner of her eye. Garrus’ eyes went wide. “Get down!” he yelled as he surged forward and knocked Shepard to the ground.

Shepard heard the sound of a sniper shot followed closely by Garrus’ shout of pain. Garrus rolled off of her, and together they crawled behind the wall. Another sniper shot grazed through her shields and made them flicker and die. They made it to the wall – it was riddled with bullet holes, but at least it was out of sight.

“I gotcha, buddy,” Shepard said as she linked her omnitool to Garrus’ hardsuit. She used some of her own medigel to close Garrus’ wound. The bullet had penetrated the armor on his left arm, went straight through the muscle and bone, and then embedded itself in the armor at his side. Shepard deployed the medigel, but the wound looked like it would need more than that.

“Thanks,” Garrus said. “I ran out of my own about two hours ago.”

“Jesus,” Shepard replied. “How did you think you were gonna survive on a single pack of medigel?”

“I didn’t think I was,” Garrus answered. Shepard looked up and through the smoke she could see the solemn look on Garrus’ face. “I knew it was the end,” he said. “I just wanted to bring down as many of those bastards as I could before it was over.”

“Garrus…”

Another sniper shot whistling through the window made them both duck further into cover.

“Can you move it?” Shepard asked, gesturing at Garrus’ arm.

Garrus tried and then grunted in pain.

_“Shit,”_ Shepard hissed through her teeth. There was no way Garrus could steady a rifle with that wound. They were down a man.

“Shepard, you can still get out of here –”

“—through where, Garrus? Even if I wanted to leave, I’ve got no exit.” Shepard gave Garrus a weak smile. “You’re stuck with me. Sorry.”

When Shepard looked over her shoulder she could see the beam of the laser sight, glowing through the smoke as it searched the window.

“We’re fucked if we don’t take out that sniper,” she said. “They’ll cover the mercs as they rush the bridge.”

Garrus tried to raise his rifle but it fell to the ground as he grunted in pain again. “I can’t hold this, Shepard.”

Shepard was quiet for a moment. “You can’t. I can.”

“No offense Shepard, but you’re not exactly known for your finesse.”

“No, I mean –” Shepard raised the barrel of the rifle and rested it on her shoulder. “All you gotta do is aim.”

Garrus stared at her. “Shepard –” he began.

“—just take the shot,” Shepard cut him off.

Together they edged out into the open window, Shepard kneeling with the barrel on her shoulder and Garrus looking down the rifle’s sights, waiting for a break in the smoke cover. The red beam of the enemy’s sights swept through the smoke before coming to rest on her forehead. Shepard closed her eyes and grit her teeth, trying to slow the pounding of her heart and the adrenaline rushing through her veins.

She heard the roar of Garrus’ shot beside her head, even over the sound of her own blood pounding in her ears. When she opened her eyes, the red sight was gone.

“I got them,” Garrus said quietly, lowering the rifle off her shoulder.

Shepard released the breath she didn’t realize she had been holding.

“Okay,” she said softly. “All we have left is –”

Suddenly the whine of an engine filled the room and the smoke around them was cleared with a rush of blowing air, revealing the Blue Suns gunship hovering just outside the window and the final charge of the mercs just behind it.

_“Run!”_ Shepard shouted as both of them bolted in separate directions.

_“Archangel!”_ a voice bellowed. _“This ends now!”_

The gunship opened fire on them as they scrambled to find cover. The gunship tracked Garrus as he ran, making his shields flash wildly before they went out completely. Garrus staggered into cover, collapsing on his hands and knees. It was as Garrus was turning to look at the gunship when a rocket exploded just in front of him, throwing him backward onto the floor.

“ _Garrus!”_

Shepard sprinted across the open room. She could hear the gunship’s mass accelerator cannons spinning up, and it drove her to move faster. Shepard dropped and slid along the floor the rest of the way, just as the gunship opened fire on her position. She kept her head low as she pulled Garrus by the shoulders to the side of the window, out of the line of fire.

He was in a bad way. The rocket blew a hole in his collar and severely burned his face. Where the heat of the rocket didn’t cauterize his wounds, Shepard could see rivulets of blue blood running down his front and dripping onto the floor.

A savage rage overcame her. Shepard’s biotics flared alight and wrapped her in a barrier as she stood. She used her biotics to lift one of the heavy crates of contraband and she carried it with her to the window. The gunship’s fire made her barrier ripple as the bullets lost their mass in the field and bounced harmlessly off her chest. Shepard raised the crate above her head, and then threw it out the window. It accelerated through the air, Shepard manipulating its mass to grow and grow until it smashed into the windshield of the gunship with as much force as she could muster.

The crate fell away from the gunship to land heavily on the bridge below. The batarian in the gunship looked dazed and bloodied, but not dead yet. Shepard raised her rifle and in an act of overkill fired an entire magazine into the compartment until the batarian was well and truly dead. The gunship dipped dangerously without input, spinning out before tumbling down the long drop off the bridge.

Shepard’s body was shaking and her nervous system buzzing from the exertion, but she managed to stumble back to Garrus and kneel beside him. She was reaching out to check for a pulse when Garrus gasped and his eyes flew open. “Garrus!” She furiously tapped at her omnitool to link into his hardsuit’s computer and started the process of applying medigel to stem the bleeding. “We’re gonna get you out of here, just hold on!”

Garrus could only respond with a horrible gurgling noise as he struggled not to choke on his own blood.

“Shepard!”

Jacob and Miranda had cleaned up the last of the charging mercs and were both calling her name as they ran up the stairs and across the room.

“Hail the _Normandy_ and call for an evac!” Shepard ordered. “I don’t care how, just get me a fucking shuttle _now!”_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Oscar Wilde
> 
> AN: hey all. I'm dealing with some health issues IRL, so updates might be a bit sporadic. thank you for reading this far, and hopefully we'll be back on track again soon


	13. demonstrated value

Garrus was in surgery for four hours.

Chakwas promised to notify her when the surgery was over, but it didn’t stop Shepard from appearing outside the medbay every half hour to test if the door was still locked. When Chakwas finally called Shepard in, she warned her that Garrus was heavily sedated and was unlikely to wake for a few more hours yet. Shepard brought a datapad and a backlog of paperwork with her to the medbay, but it sat untouched in her lap. She was leaning back in her chair with her arms crossed, staring at the floor just past her feet when she heard the medbay doors slide open.

“Commander,” Miranda greeted her.

“Ms. Lawson,” Shepard answered.

Miranda moved to stand just inside her field of view. She turned her head to look at Garrus on the bed. “How is he?” she asked.

Garrus was heavily bandaged. His face was set with an artificial graft while the burns healed, and his torso was covered with gauze bandages protecting the microincisions where the bullets were removed and his wounds were treated. Chakwas informed Shepard that the damage to some of his organs was so severe it required cybernetic intervention to restore normal functioning. They could, hypothetically, be removed at a later time… but that was a far ways off.

“Doc says he took a bad hit, but he’s got good odds,” Shepard answered. “He’s a tough son of a bitch. He won’t go down easy.”

“That’s good to hear.”

A moment of silence passed between them before Miranda spoke again. “Shepard, what you did –”

“Don’t fucking start with me, Miranda.” Shepard’s voice was low, little over a growl.

“—was reckless and rash.”

“We really doing this again?”

“You let your personal feelings overrule your judgment.”

“What does it matter if I got the fucking job done?”

“The Director spent two years of our lives and billions of credits to bring you back.” Miranda’s gaze was frigid. “You make me question whether it was worth it.”

The hard lines of Shepard’s eyes sharpened as they narrowed. “You’re jealous, aren’t you,” she said. “You’re jealous that you’re not the Director’s favorite child anymore.”

“I’ve already proven my value to the Director,” Miranda retorted, coldly. “Let’s hope you’re able to do the same.”

Shepard’s temper was flaring when she heard a groan come from the bed. She stood so fast the chair scraped across the floor as she rushed to Garrus’ side.

“Garrus?”

“Shepard,” Garrus croaked. “What happened?”

“You took a fucking rocket to the face, buddy,” Shepard couldn’t help but smile at him. “But you took it like a champ.”

Shepard tracked the sound of Miranda’s boots on the floor as she left the room, the door closing behind her.

“Listen,” Shepard said to Garrus. “I have something to ask you, but I’m gonna wait until you aren’t high on painkillers.”

“Whatever it is, I’ll do it,” Garrus answered. “I owe you my life, Shepard.”

“Well. I might have to call in that favor.”


End file.
